Busy Bee

As always, I've neglected the one piece of the internet that I love so dearly. Too many of my blog posts start out like this, unfortunately. We moved houses at the end of May and have been ridiculously busy since then. Traveling back and forth, setting up the house to make it feel like a home, searching for jobs, dealing with car troubles and Pippa troubles (the latter of which is, thankfully, over with and our little girl is feeling much better).

This isn't to say I haven't had the time to do a quick update now and then, I just got out of the swing of things and it's been difficult to get back in. It makes me much sadder than it probably makes you, my lovely readers. I won't promise I'm back to blogging every week, but I'm definitely stepping up my game. I have an exciting plan for my tiny plot in internet city, and feel like I have to put in more effort to accomplish my goals.  This is purposefully vague.

In lieu of an actual post, I'm going to give you some of my favorite house related Instagrams. I'm calling them HouseGrams... Just go with me on this.

1) Pippa packed up and ready to go (with a fresh haircut to boot)! 2) Taylor and our new (rented) place. 3) The most gigantic bathroom mirror and the duck collection. 4) The closet I could live in. 5) Taylor's side of the room and how we spent a week watching Spartacus. 6) A new kitchen for new food -whipped cream!

It's a very happy home. I walked around for the first few weeks saying "You know, I really love (insert random point here) about the house." Everything from the giant closet to the gas stove, the big backyard to the little frogs that inhabit it. The house has good energy and I've found elderflowers in the backyard, a sign that the fairies are near. We also have a gorgeous crepe myrtle and a "pond" where turtles swim, but mosquitoes like crazy. I'm going to plant some mosquito repelling plants out there soon to see if that helps. It's been busy, but we're really enjoying ourselves and I'm loving having an empty canvas to decorate. Also, the designers of this house were genius -the lighting is wonderful! See, just one more thing to add to my I-Love-This-House List.

Possibly an outfit post soon? I have one that needs to be edited from a couple weeks  ago. We'll see. XOXO.

A Pretty Closet makes a Better Day

   Or well... some sort of saying like that. I was told by Taylor that I simply had to organize our closet. And soon. When our roommate moved in I had to take all of my extra clothing out of her closet and back into ours, and since then it has looked like a volcano erupted and left behind a trail of destruction. I am going to indulge you and show you a photograph, but just know that it embarrasses me so:

Before

   So yes. This was Before. The terrible, no good, horrendous Before. Taylor went out of town last weekend and thus, I tackled the Before. It took many hours of music, many hours of purging things that I didn't need, and quite a few hours where I forgot to eat and take breaks. It was well worth it in the end, as here's the final product:

After- The lighting makes it look sort of like a haunted house!

   Tada! I have an entire large box of donation things and everything is super organized in the After. There are still too many clothes in there, but it's going to take another couple of purge sessions to set it straight. Plus, I'm going to have to get onto Taylor for keeping shirts that a) don't fit or b) are yucky. We also need to learn to control our laundry monsters a little better. But on the bright side, the most difficult part is finished!
   I've even made the wall above our desk (the wall next to our closet) more organized, and much more adorable. I put up our second section of twinkly lights, moved around my bulletin/inspiration board, and made the best banner ever. The banner is my favorite part and it was ridiculously easy!

Wall above Taylor's desk and my banner!

 The Cutest Banner You'll Ever Make Instructions:

1. Go to the craft store of your choice. Purchase three sheets of different color coordinating scrapbook paper. I chose one patterned one and two plain ones, but you could do lots of patterns, more than three papers, only plain colors- whatever your little heart desires really!
2. Hopefully you already own a needle (Sadly I didn't so I had to buy a sewing kit- life of a college kid, right?), so just purchase some color of embroidery thread that matches all three of your paper choices. Embroidery thread worked well for me because it's thin enough to go through the paper but thick enough to see on the wall.
3. Cut triangles out of your scrapbook paper. I did five from my patterned paper and four from each of my plain papers, but again you could do whatever works for you. I also found a good picture of triangles for a banner on Pinterest, which helped to keep mine all the same size and shape. Lay your triangles out on a flat surface in the pattern you'd like when you're finished cutting.
4. Thread your needle and cut the piece of embroidery thread so that it is at least an extra foot longer than your row of triangle papers. Make sure the triangles are all facing the right direction and that the correct side of the paper is facing up! Even my plain colored paper had a textured side and a smooth side, so be careful which one you're using as the top.
5. Tie a knot in the end of your thread, leaving about five inches so you can use that to hang the banner. Start weaving the needle and thread through the flat top part of the triangle. You should have two holes in each triangle. Look at the little tutorial I drew y'all!
6. Weave and weave until you get to the end of your triangles, and then tie a knot.
7. Spread the triangles out evenly on the thread. Hang up your ends on the wall, either tying them or using pushpins. I used pushpins but then still had wiggle room, so I tied bows in the end! You could also tie them across a table or between two trees or above a doorway! The possibilities are kind of endless.
8. Admire your super delightful new decoration!

   And that is it my loves! Easy-peasy and it really helped make that corner of our room feel complete. I will definitely be making holiday themed banners, birthday banners, everyday-of-the-week banners! I've got a bit more of the closet to work on, just bought matching hangers and a few more organizing tidbits today, so au revoir until later dears! XO.