She Bangs

A few years ago I hopped on the bang train. It was a really quick ride before the blunt bangs turned into side bangs within about 3 weeks.

 

Circa 2011

Well, I’ve been wanting to do something different, so I whipped out the ol’ craft scissors (you know, the sharp ones for fabric only) on a Sunday evening on a whim.

“I’m going to be in the bathroom a while babe…don’t come find me until I’m done. It could be bad, I’m hacking off my bangs.”

 

I watched a few YouTube videos and I was ready.

*Mistake #1 – see how much hair I let down on my left side? No bueno. That’s now the fat side of my bangs.

chop chop chop

I’m smiling because I hadn’t looked in the mirror yet.

And then I did. That is dead sexy.

What in the world did I just do? Some things are not meant to be done yourself…

At this point I turned red, my heart started pounding, and I got really nervous.

OH NO, really, what was I thinking. Not to mention this was the Sunday night before a huge division meeting at my work that week, in which I’d have to be giving several presentations.

Yeah, I didn’t plan that one out too well.

So an hour later and hundreds of hair pieces stuck all over my face and chest, here’s what I ended up with.

It could have been much worse. I’m mostly happy with how they turned out. I’m going to let them grow out a little bit and then get them properly hacked off by a professional.

I learned my lesson not to do it again!

An Organized Pantry…and Some Blood

We hadn’t yet organized the pantry since moving in 3 months ago when everything was just thrown in with no rhyme or reason.

It was a disaster and has been on my TO DO list for a while but Bunko did me in.

My GMa saw the inside of my pantry and said something along the lines of “Tamara I cannot believe your pantry is such a disaster! Everything else is so nice and organized and I’m very glad to see it’s junky somewhere!”

Ha!

So that lit a little fire under my hiney to get that thing organized.

I had dozens of beautiful pinned pantries on Pinterest.

However, it’s a pantry for goodness sake. If I’m spending $$$ for nice baskets and gorgeous apothecary jars, they’re going where they can be seen regularly. Not behind a closed door.

So I hit up Wal Mart for El-Cheapo plain white baskets.

I tried Target first but they were about twice as much. Eh, no thanks.

Wally World baskets will do the job.

It was now organized, but definitely needed some pizazz in the form of chalkboard labels!

I cut out labels with my cricut. I keep chalkboard vinyl in stock and whipped it out for this occasion.

Love this stuff – find it at Hobby Lobby!

I was cutting the vinyl with my rotary cutter to fit the mat when something bad happened…

DON’T SCROLL DOWN IF BLOOD GROSSES YOU OUT!

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One minute I’m just sitting there imagining my pretty new tags and the next minute I hacked a chunk of my finger off.

See it? Follow the tip of the arrow…it was still stuck on the blade. Nice!

From underneath you can really see the missing corner of my finger.

Makes my insides do the willy dance!

I’m such a wuss. It hurt like the dickens.

However I’m sure it doesn’t compare to when my Dad cut his finger nearly completely off with a table saw.

I’ll have to find those pictures for you guys!

Anywho, I cried and was sure to get a picture for the blog.

Then after it finally stopped bleeding it was back to work.

The Cricut could take the cutting from there.

I just peeled and stuck them to the baskets then went to town with the fun part, writing on the labels!

I love this pen, but it’s hard to get off my boards. I used it on these though since they wouldn’t really be changed often. I also recently read that using a magic eraser would remove this pretty good.

Don’t judge the unhealthy contents of our pantry…focus on the pretties!

The top shelf needs some help too but for now, this is a good start!

Our trash can goes at the bottom but no one wants to see that!

And I still capital L-O-V-E the chalkboard for lists. I use it all the time. I am 100% pleased with the paint too. It writes great and erases perfectly clean with the swipe of a wet paper towel.

I also got a drawer pull from Lowes and hung it to hold chalk!

Perfection.

Nothing like a little bit of blood, sweat chalk, and tears going into a project!

Live Oak Island, FL

Last weekend I joined my parents at the coast for some R&R. It was the first boat day of the year for me!

The fish weren’t biting much but we had such a great day on the water!

 

We ended the day at Spring Creek Restaurant – yum yum!

Thanks again Mom & Dad for treating me to a fabulous day!

Dresser Makeover

Well, this was one of those projects that I thought would be so easy, and it absolutely kicked my butt and tested all my patience.

In fact it was a nightmare from painting all the way to the knobs.

This awesome dresser was David’s Grandma’s. When she passed away, no one claimed it so I said I’d love to take it. It’s been sitting in storage for over a year now and I finally got around to giving it an update now that I had a garage to work in.

For the first time ever I used Annie Sloan Chalk Paint. I’d heard such wonderful things about this paint. Let’s just say I had very high expectations.

Supposedly the paint goes on like a breeze, dries like a breeze, waxes like a breeze, and you’re left with enough to do at least 3 or 4 more small projects.

Well, I hated it. It was so expensive, $75 bought the two items above. A quart of paint and an even smaller can of wax. I was sick to my stomach for spending that much money on paint, but it was supposedly “magic paint”!! And not to mention, I couldn’t buy the corresponding brushes. The paint brush you’re supposed to use is $28 and the wax brush is $35. There was no way I was spending that much money on paint brushes. I picked up a brush from the place I bought the paint that they said would be okay if I wasn’t buying the other brush. I got a wax brush from Lowes for $8.

 

I did pick up these nifty painting triangles from Lowes. I loved them.

Still smiling at this point because I just started.

Nude sports bras are not cute in pictures…

After one coat.

The thing about chalk paint is that you don’t have to prime or sand.

Well, this dresser took three…three coats of paint. I still didn’t have full coverage but I didn’t have enough paint to do a fourth coat. It’s okay as is, but it could have used one more coat. What I thought I would finish in a day, ended up taking several.

Then I had to wax it at the end. That thoroughly sucked too!

So besides the paint, I had big trouble with the knobs. The original knobs were just not my style, so I set off in search of new ones at Hobby Lobby. I spent literally an hour in the store staring at knobs. If I found something I remotely liked, they didn’t have enough. I needed 14 total.

Then I got an idea. I remembered seeing Teal and Lime’s Faux Malachite knobs and I knew what I was going to do. I bought up almost all the white knobs and was super excited about making this happen.

Well, after being gone for two hours and coming home with $30 worth of plain white knobs (?!)…that I’d have to color with a marker (?!) and bake(?!), let’s just say David was less than happy. Here I go, doing something weird again.

Why can’t you just buy NORMAL stuff???

I colored knobs and let them sit over night.

Then I baked them to set the color.

The tutorial I read said she tried to scratch them and everything and the color didn’t come off after baking.

Well, of course that was not the case with mine. The first one I picked up to screw onto a drawer, left blue ink all over my fingers and was completely wiped off of the knob.

#$^@#&%^*^%!!!

Seriously!! Can I catch a freaking break?!!

UGH.

I carefully put them all on, smudging each in the process. Got lots of “I told you so” looks from David. And proceeded to cry.

Because in addition to the color rubbing off, one of them broke in the process and is actually super glued right onto a drawer front, and the two on the big cabinets’ screws are too long and the doors wouldn’t shut.

I have temporarily removed the inside middle drawer until I can cut the screws down.

It really was ONE.THING.AFTER.ANOTHER

My original intent was to put it behind the couch with some lamps on top. But unfortunately we don’t have any floor outlets and it was kind of in the way without serving a purpose.

So now it’s currently living in our room.

Last complaint about the chalk paint - the color. I spent nearly an hour deciding on a color at the store. They had a few pieces painted in this Old White color. They were all crisp bright white and beautiful. And yet mine turned out ivory white which pretty much doesn’t match anything in the house one bit. Sad face. 

Now I really wish I’d gone with something else. I am absolutely crushing on Retro Ranch Reno’s blue buffet.

Maybe I can change it up again one day…

I do really love the dresser and I’m digging the extra storage space but I am mad at myself about the knobs and my color choice. Wish I’d have gone a “regular” route because it’s still not technically done. I am going to give them a coat of mod podge and hope for the best!