There's a first time for everything!

Growing up in Iowa, we take tractors for granted.

So, I went back to the homeland this weekend with Kevin (that's my cute hunk of a husband -- he hates it when I say things like that)(and the homeland is Southeast Iowa, where we both grew up). He had to help on his family farm, and I had to go to a baby shower (for my adorable friend and her adorable baby), and afterwards I met up with Kevin to ride with him spreading manure - via their new awesome tractor. 

 No, the manure part isn't awesome, just the new tractor part was awesome

 - GPS steering and all.

 Kev could pretty much just watch movies all day in that cab. Don't let people fool you, farming is amazingly easy - ha! He'd kill me if he ever read that too.

So, after some rounds of filling and spreading manure, my good friend, Marie joined us in the tractor. And, she told us that this was her first time riding in a tractor, EVER. What!? This girl has traveled across the globe by herself, she has visited over 15 countries, she's practically bilingual, does amazing things all of the time, and she has never ridden in a tractor in her 27 years of living in rural Iowa! How could this be? I don't know. We were all perplexed!
So, we took pictures to commemorate the occasion.

We told her she could drive it she wanted to (aka, push a button), but she politely declined (the picture is a fake, we're standing still). Maybe, next time we'll get her to drive. And, then, we'll get her running a combine.

B-day Indulgences

Shew... I finally had an afternoon to just relax! It's my birthday and I took all selfish liberties and pampered myself! I'm of course always on a budget, so it didn't involve any trips to the salon, just at home with products from my cupboards. I got these ideas from my good friend Mandy, and the other from Natural Health magazine. I lost the page that I tore out, so had to make up some of the ingredients, so bear with me.

Beauty Treatment #1... Mission Hair Repair
I haven't been eating the healthiest the past couple weeks, and I've been stressing my tresses out with my job at the barn. I clean horse stalls in the mornings and the dust, the cold weather and over shampooing is getting it fried!  I had to add some nutrients to my hair. So, I grabbed the ingredients that my dear friend Mandy tells me about, and I made me a "Soak."

Here's how it gets after weeks of neglect.

And, here's the ingredients for the "hair soak"

 The essentials for the soak are 2 eggs and oils. I was lucky to have these items on hand: Aloe Vera juice, coconut milk spray, argan oil, olive oil and lemon juice

I mix them all up in a bowl and dump it on my head as good as I can... I suggest wearing an old shirt.

Let it dry for about an hour, or until you're tired of it (p.s. It will get stiff from the egg drying) Then, stick your head under the faucet and shampoo your hair as good as possible. And voila! Healthy hair again.

Now, keep in mind your hair still holds some of the oils, so it is a little thicker than normal, and will look greasy for the night, but after tomorrow's shower, it will look and feel like a million bucks.




Beauty Treatment #2... Mission Detox
Oh, no, my day of pampering wasn't over. Next, I wanted to cleanse my body of toxins. I don't know the science behind any of this, but I love taking baths and Natural Health Magazine suggested this subtle detox, so I figured I'd give it a try.

All I did was take these ingredients and poured them in my bath water:
Since I didn't have the exact recipe, I just guessed:
2 cups of Epsom Salt
1/2 cup of baking soda
1/2 cup apple cider vinegar
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1 green tea with cranberry tea bag - yes, just let it steep beside you

And, there you go. Rub-a-dub and soak in the tub. Give it 20 minutes and supposedly, something good happened to your organs.

So, what a wonderful b-day. I got to do completely frivolous things  And, I didn't have to spend a dime.

Post Cards and Burlap

I had a plethora of Styrofoam balls that I didn't know what to do with. I have pondered covering them with glitter or wrapping them in tissue paper. But, I have seen some beautiful rustic cottages lately that made me look twice at burlap and old feed sacks.

I wanted a completed antique look, so I got onto my computer and cropped a couple of my Great-Grandmother's old post cards. Aren't they AWESOME!? Look, it says 1913 on the post office's stamp. I got the idea to blow up old post cards from Ifferslittlenest.blogspot.com on pinterest.

 

The balls are as simple as they look. I heated up the hot glue gun and cut the fabrics into strips. I just glued the end and wrapped the balls with fabric until they were covered.

 Love the Penmanship! This 99 year old post card has aged so well!

These old post cards hold such stories. Especially this next one... with... the SECRET!
 My great-grandmother received a letter from Alta. I'm not sure who this lady is. But this is what it she writes:

Sept. 24, 1913
Dear Nelda,
We have a lovely spring morning had autumn yesterday. I am going to sew to-day as fast as ever as I can; have 5 aprons to make won't I be well supplied when I get them finished. I think the folks will be home by the first of next week if not before. If I had you here I would tell you a secret but mustn't write it. As ever, Alta

Whoa! Right! I mean, what could the secret be? She "mustn't" write it? Sounds like I'd be interested in hearing that secret! The front of the post card is a sassy woman and a man fanning her with a fancy feather background. And it reads "The kind of Fanning I Like" Ha. I like to think of them having sassy secrets and telling each other.

P.S. I love their names and how they write words like "lovely" and "well supplied".
As Ever,
Kay

Necklace Organizer

Need a little organization in your life? Check out my Etsy shop, or stop in at my Kalona, IA location, to buy this lovely gem. It is an old up-cycled window frame! I cleaned it up, gave it a layer of varnish, added hooks and it was ready for the public!

Love the weathered wood!

Project Dressing Room

Oh, hello blog. It has been a while. But, don't hate me, I have been very busy.... turning my Home Decor boutique into a Clothing/Home Decor Boutique. Imagine Anthropologie on a hick-town budget.

Operation: Dressing Room
Being a reclaimer by nature, I went to my husband's family farm and took some old barn boards to build the new dressing rooms. I hope his dad doesn't notice that the sides of his barns are slowly disappearing...

And here's the barn elephant in the room.

Just needs a little paint....

Next, choosing curtains and clothes...

Reclaiming the Old

I just wanted to show a picture of a seed sack pillow that I created for the shop. It is a true "antique" upcycled into a pillow for rustic decoration!

Happy Friday!

How To: Dress Form... so that's what it's called...

At my shop I had a little dilemma... too many necklaces and not enough cool places to display them. That problem was solved with this idea to get a "dress form" that is the fake bodice thing that looks like the silhouette of a woman... well, a fake woman... a real woman would never have that narrow of a stomach and that wide of a chest.

So, that leads me to my second problem. Those things cost HUNDREDS of dollars! Really. Vintage Dress Forms are very expensive and even a new one at Hobby Lobby was out of my range.

So I thought to myself... I could make one of those... easy... but how...well, with chicken wire and burlap of course!

I started with a tall spindle that was recovered from a house remodel (free :) ) Then, I screwed it to the bottom of two wooden discs from Hobby Lobby. I measured it to find center and drilled holes from the back side and then used 3 inch screws to secure it.

Next, I took chicken wire and cut a piece that was about 35 inches long. Then, starting at the bottom, I folded it around and twisted the wire onto itself to secure it. That created the bottom of the skirt. Moving up about where a waist would get skinnier I overlapped the wire more to make it skinnier and twisted the wire to secure it. To create the bust, I found the spot where the two ends meet and secured them, by leaving a space for... cleavage... can I say that here... :) I did. Now, push and pull the chicken wire to create your preferred shape. You can use other pieces of wire to hold the form. Next, place your form over the tall spindle and secure it with screws.

Now, you need to create the upper chest and neck. Take a second piece of chicken wire that is 1/4 the size of the other and shape it like so.... then attach it to the bigger form by twisting the metal ends.

Then, cover your whole creation with badding. Use hot glue where you can to secure it.

Now, cover the badding with any fabric of choice. This is a "sewing-free" option. All I did was glue burlap onto the badding in strips starting from the bottom and working my way to the top.

Then, I added a little disc to the top of the neck that I painted blue, added bulky necklaces and a cute ribbon belt to give it a feminine touch.

So, here it is: my ten dollar dress form.

How to: Window Picture Frame

Here's a REALLY quick and REALLY easy DIY project - A 5 minute task....if you have an old 6 pane window lying around ;)

This old window was found at a Garage Sale for a real bargain. The lady put in new windows and wanted the old ones to go to a good home. I considered my home as good as any, I suppose, I'd treat the window right. This window was an easy clean-up. Just a little Windex really. Some older windows that I have gotten require MUCH more labor. Some have required bleach, sanding and/or layers of varnish.

Once your blank window "canvas" is ready, pick out your favorite 6 photos. It is important to pick pictures that will coordinate. Either in theme, or color, or people... or something. I chose my WEDDING photos! Yay! Shameless, I know... but I wanted something that would look elegant. And, I used photos that didn't show my husband or my faces to keep it intriguing.

Decide the layout of your 6 photos. My pictures included 3 that were up close pictures with texture and 3 that were people shots, I staggered the photos to make the over-all appeal balanced.

Next, use "Scrapbook Corner Adhesives" from Hobby Lobby. A cheap and AMAZING way to keep the photos in place. And they're clear, so it is an illusion that the photos are squashed between two sheets of glass, but no, this is SOO much easier!

Then, grab the corner stickers place them on two corners of a photo (I start with only two corners with stickies so it doesn't get out of hand with four stickies getting in the way). Now, from the back side of the window, I "eyeball" where center is for each photo in the frame (if you are a meticulous type, then grab a measuring tape already!) Do that to all 6 photos. Then go back and stick the other two corners of each photo.

And viola! There is your 5 minute picture frame... Or, in my case, the 2 hour picture frame. Between cleaning the window, picking and printing my FAVORITE wedding pics and fighting the corner stickies!

Also, consider what hardware you'd use for hanging the window. I prefer thick gauge wire strung between two sturdy screws.

How to: Hymn Christmas Tree

Well, I thought I'd add a few "how-to" guides of some of my creations. My new invention is the swirly hymn tree.

First, you take chicken wire and wrap it into a cone. About 14 inches tall.

Next, I cover the entire frame with full hymn pages. Then, I cut 1 1/2" wide x 4 " long strips out of pages of an old hymn. Then I curl just the ends of them up when they're in a stack. Using a hot glue gun, start gluing from the bottom up. I go around the base and then add the next layer on the joints of the layer below it (like a brick layer puts new bricks on the joints of the bricks below them). And keep working up until you're to the top! At the top you may have to adjust your hymn cuts by making a triangle cut to fit the top point, and you may even need to cut some fatter or thinner strips to fill in gaps as you go. Just work with it.
You can also hot glue a piece of black felt to the bottom to make a soft base.

And Viola! Twenty minutes later and you have a fun and swirly DIY Christmas tree:)