Weekend Projects // Front Yard Makeover

My husband and I made it our mission this last weekend to get our front yard a bit more presentable. The two pictures below show just how overgrown and ridiculous our front flower bed has gotten.

 

 

Yes, the stump to the right is cut to resemble a hand flipping you off. My husband got artistic with a chainsaw one day and that is what he came up with.

 

 

As you can see, the front of our house was not exactly tidy. We took a trip to Lowe's and Walmart and gathered some supplies and plants. I did do a little research beforehand to see what plants and flowers were the easiest to grow here in Oklahoma for a black thumbed individual. After a lot of work, our new front yard is looking completely different and much better.

 

 

 

 

We are planning to put pea gravel around the steps to keep the grass at bay. We have been trying to get the grass to look better after multiple trees and part being used as a driveway for years caused most of the grass to die. But I think this makeover has made such a difference and will inspire us to do more.

 

I'm thinking about keeping these weekend projects going and making this a regular thing on this blog.

 

DIY Oil & Water Makeup Remover

I'm at it again, making my own beauty products. I've been using a couple different oil & water makeup removers that I received as samples and I'm running low. As I've said before, I have been trying to save money and this makeup remover seemed easy enough to make.

What I Used:

Apricot Oil
Water
5-6 Drops Rose Hip Oil
Splash of Melvita Orange Blossom Floral Water

Preparation was very simple, I boiled the water and rose hip oil and then combined the apricot oil and water 50/50 in a small dropper bottle (I bought a pack of 12 a few months ago from Amazon. Check them out here.) After shaking well, I let the mixture sit overnight before using. It worked great to take my makeup off but I felt like something was missing. I added the splash of Melvita Orange Blossom water for a little extra nourishment and scent and I'm very pleased with the results.

What an exciting photo!

My homemade makeup remover takes off all of my makeup and leaves my skin feeling so soft! It's much cheaper than other makeup removers and I can tweak the formula in the future to meet my ever changing skin care needs. I have noticed that as I use it, it seems that more of the water is disapearing quicker than the oil. I think this may be partially do to the dropper bottle, I may need cut out any plastic pieces in the spout. I also suspect that it could also be my mixture, I need to look up the ingredients in other makeup removers and see if there is anything that might affect the formula.


I'm excited about my little creation! I think my next DIY beauty product might be a homemade cornstarch pressed powder. If it works out, I'll write up a post!

DIY - Pumpkin Spice Coffee Scrub and Herbs & Oils Face Toner

I've been feeling a little down because I haven't been able to go out and buy a lot of new beauty products. My husband and I are trying to cut back on our spending and since I have tons of stuff that I can use, I've held back on buying anything new. Today I was really feeling the urge to buy things and decided that I would make a few products instead. Spend exactly 0 dollars and get new, custom stuff? Score!

Coffee scrubs have been all over the blog world lately and I thought I would make one of my own. At one point in time I had a coffee scrub from Bath & Body Works that was amazing. I love coffee, the smell, the taste, pretty much everything about coffee and I loved using this scrub. Then it decided to leak all over the place and make a huge mess. Not cool. I kept this little issue in mind when making my scrub so that I can hopefully avoid a mess.

Another popular product that I see so many people talking about is toners. I don't think I've ever bought a toner before, all of the good ones seem too expensive for something that I don't think would make a huge difference with my skin. I started looking up recipes for toners and as I had guessed, they are incredibly simple, mostly containing water and a few other natural ingredients. Well, I can surely make that! So I did.



I've had a tub this size for almost
a year and have only used half.

On a side note, how amazing is coconut oil? My sunburn that I got over Memorial Day weekend was a little worse than I originally thought and I've been slathering myself with coconut oil since I got home. I can really see a difference in how my sunburn has healed, it started to tan in just a couple of days and although it did peel in places, it did not peel nearly as much I would normally with a sunburn. It's also great for general moisturizing, especially after shaving my legs. I do have to use sparingly on my face because I've got naturally oily skin. It does work great before or after we take the motorcycle out to protect against the wind whipping in my face. I've only tried coconut oil once in my hair and I had to wash it 4 times to get the oily feel out of my hair, so I only plan to use it if my hair is begging for moisture. Regardless of this, I cannot recommend coconut oil enough.

*I had all of the ingredients below on hand. If you don't have any of these and would like to find some, I would suggest Amazon. Great deals and a huge selection. If you have a locally owned store that you can buy these items at, do that! Support your local business!

Herbs & Oils Face Toner Ingredients

Water
Dried Rosemary
Dried Mint
Dried Chamomile
Coconut Oil
Rose Hip Oil*
Sweet Orange Oil*
Argan Oil*
Avocado Oil*
Apricot Oil*
Almond Oil*

* I only used a few drops of each of these and mixed them together in a little squirt bottle.

There were alot of different ways to make toners, most being "mix ingredients together, spray on face." Because I did not have filtered water and I was working with dried herbs, I decided to boil my water and create a sort of tea with the rosemary, mint, and chamomile.


And...that looks gross.

The finished product. Again, gross.

 I added a few drops of the oil mixture and a few drops of coconut oil as it was boiling. Once I thought it was good and tea-like, I took it off of the heat and let it sit for a bit to cool. I drained all of the herbs out in a coffee filter and poured the liquid into a small spray bottle that I had. The toner is currently sitting in the fridge to cool and I'll post a little update once I've used it to let everyone know how it turned out.

I would love to make a toner with fresh herbs to take full advantage of their healing properties. I love using herbs in cooking and my mom has always used herbs for health reasons. Everytime I had some sort of ailment, my mom would have teas and herbal supplements ready for me. If I wasn't such a terrible gardener, I would grow my own. I'll have to make a trip to my grandma's house because I know she always has fresh herbs in her garden.


Pumpkin Spice Coffee Scrub Ingredients

Not the best picture, the lighting in my kitchen sucks.
But aren't my counter tops gorgeous?

1/8th cup coffee beans
1 k-cup of Pumpkin Spice
2 tablespoons sugar
1 tablespoon coconut oil
apricot oil
cinnamon

*Note: None of these measurements are exact, I pretty much did everything to fit the containers that it would be in.

While digging around in my cabinet for supplies, I noticed I had a couple of Pumpkin Spice k-cups for my Keurig and got excited at the thought of a bit of pumpkin in my scrub. (I also have been wanting to cut open a k-cup to see exactly what the insides look like, thus killing two birds with one stone!) The coffee in the k-cup is ground very fine and to add a bit more scrubby to the scrub, I ground the regular coffee a little more coarse. The coffee, sugar, and coconut oil were all put in the container and then I added apricot oil until it was moist, but not runny. (Hopefully this will keep the mixture from seperating and making a mess. The Bath & Body Works scrub was very oily.) I then added a little cinnamon, no specific amount, just dumped some in and mixed well.


I, of course, immediately used it on my hands and they are now soft and smell of wonderful coffee with a hint of pumpkin. I'm glad that I decided to grind the regular coffee up coarsly, I like my exfoliaters to be a little rough.

I'm excited to use this scrub tonight in the shower. I don't often do full body scrubs. I'm really not sure why, the skin on my body is prone to being dry and itchy. There is also the added benefit of coffee apparently helping to minimize the appearance of cellulite (I'm not sure if I believe this, but it can't hurt to try) and who couldn't use a little cellulite reduction? I'll also post a little update to let everyone know how I liked this scrub.


I hope that my little projects have inspired others to make their own. DIY beauty products are an amazing, fun way to treat yourself and not bankrupt yourself. They also work great as gifts for friends and family. I only wish that we had more places around here that you could buy the fresh ingredients and other DIY beauty essentials. Thankfully, there is always Amazon!

(I know this post is kind of ridiculous in its length, I was very excited about my little projects!)

How Heather Got Her Sewing Groove Back

I had every intention of putting together a simple sarong yesterday when I got home from work. I had the material I wanted to use and it was as simple as hemming up a rectangle. But then I decided to add some trim. And then I remembered this amazing fabric that I had got that I wasn't sure how I was going to use. I stuck with the sarong idea and decided I would add a strip of this fabric to the top and be done.



The original sarong material. It is a rayon blend burnout jersey that is
slightly more green than what this picture shows.

The awesome material that was added.
This is also a rayon blend (I think) with very little stretch to it.

Due to my inability to cut fabric straight (I seriously have a problem with this) the top piece that I cut and sewed together was not what I had intended to do, but it ended up looking better than I originally had planned. I then removed the trim that I had sewed on earlier and now I am working on a dress. I have never made a dress before so this should be interesting.

I have been sewing since I was 4 but I would not call myself a skilled seamstress. I know the basics and know alot of the techniques, I just have always had a problem making them happen. I am terrible at following patterns and get frustrated because any pattern that I use I always have to alter to make it fit me better and that can be quite difficult. My New Year's resolution this year was to work on my sewing skills and for once I think I might follow through with it.

Once I have a little more done and its not just a ball of fabric, I'll take some pictures. What do you think of the fabric choices? Not the most typical of fabrics, but they are perfectly my style.



What did you make today?

 

I love making jewelry. I love crafts in general, but my craft of choice is jewelry making. I've recently got into working with leather and I wanted to make a big leather cuff. I originally was going to embellish the cuff with studs or other colors of leather, but when I got this one put together and wrapped, I couldn't bring myself to add anything.

 

 

The red leather that I used is so gorgeous and bright, how could I add anything to it? I knew that I would just end up with a gaudy mess if I tried to embellish the bracelet.

 

This bracelet was very simple to make. I used an empty tape roll and glued/wrapped the leather around. Once it was pretty well attached, I added a piece of black felt on the inside to cover the seams.

 

I've got several other leather pieces in the making and I will post these once they are done!