Coffee Table Part Deux

Hope everyone is having a fabulous weekend! We've been busy around here but that doesn't mean I neglected to work on my coffee table! I'm so excited that this project is moving along again. 


If you don't remember I started making this table that I had seen at Anthropologie:

I loved the table but not the price tag. So I set out to make one of my own- doing research, drawing up plans, getting steel cut ect. Then last Novemeber I started on the smaller coffee table, but the project stopped there for a good while.

This past Saturday despite the heat wave we're experiencing here in San Antonio I took my husband up on his offer to watch the Con-Man for a few hours so I could get some welding done. It took me a while to get started, I had to remember how everything was supposed to fit together. I was worried for a minute that I had some of the pieces cut to the wrong size - but all was well!

The type of welding I do is called arc welding or stick welding. I learned a trick online that I wanted to try out this time around. The website suggested cutting the welding sticks in half to give better control. I tried it out but it didn't work to well for me, maybe I'll try it again next time.

I also got some much needed tools to make this project easier- an angle and some clamps. Thank goodness I did! It made everything go so much faster and all my angles were straight!

I was in a bit of a rush to finish so I didn't get to take many progress pictures but I snapped a few.

So, all I have left to do is grind the slag (ugly black stuff in above picture), spray paint the frame and built the wooden tops! 

I need to get this finished up before our big move. It's just over a month away!

Linking Here!

How did you enjoy your weekend? Any fun projects to talk about?

Super Easy Tea light Holder

One of the things that I love about our house is that it is a gift that keeps on giving. Our dog, Gracie, loves to run underneath the house and bring me presents. It's usually just an old beer can or two that was left behind by construction workers when they built the home, but this time she actually brought me something useful!

She brought me this awesome chunk of wood! Most people might dismiss this as trash but I like it, it's all weathered and distressed and cool looking. (I have this problem where I can't throw things away- it drives my husband nuts.) Anyway- I knew I could make something out of it but what? 

Hmmm... a tea light holder? Yes!

This was super easy to make and only took about 30 minutes from start to finish and I had all the materials to make it already on hand. If you want to make one of these yourself all you need is:

A piece of wood (If you aren't fortunate to have a dog who fetches you wood your local home improvement store can cut wood for you to your desired length, usually for free!)

1 1/2" Drill bit 

Power drill

Sander & Sandpaper

Stain or paint

Tea Lights

First I sanded my wood to smooth it out and get rid of uneven edges.

Then take your drill bit,

And use your tea light as a guide to measure the depth to which you will cut, then tape it off. This way you will not drill to deep into the wood.

Next use a pencil to mark the spots you will drill. SInce I was only drilling 2 holes I just eyeballed it. If your using a longer piece of wood and drilling several holes, measuring might be the way to go!

After I drilled my holes I sanded a little more around the newly drilled holes. Then I used some Minwax stain I had on hand and finished it up. Remember to wipe off any extra stain before it dries for an even finish. This allows the wood grain to show through. 

Then light it up!

For such and quick easy (And free!) project I'm happy with it. Something like this would make a great gift, and to change things up a bit you could use colored tea lights for different seasons, what do you think? 

Linking here!

House Hunters: Altus Style

Someone asked me today if we had gone house hunting in Altus yet. 

My answer? Nope, and we probably aren't going to. We've talked it over and we're probably going to rent in Oklahoma. I'm kind of bummed out about this but it makes the most sense. We're hoping to only be there for 2 years, and lets face it- Altus isn't exactly the real estate mecca of the world. So we don't want to be stuck with a house we can't sell.


But that doesn't mean I haven't been looking.  Most of the homes for sale are new construction. The town has grown recently (21,000 and growing!) and new homes have been built. It seems to be mainly military families buying and selling these homes.

The other side of the coin is older homes- seemingly from the 70's and 80's era. Possibly from when the town experienced a growth spurt at the time. And from what I can tell from the interiors most have not had any updating to them.

I don't have a problem with houses like this- they intrigue me actually. Looking at the pictures gives me all sorts of ideas on how to update and modernize them. But- since our stint in Altus is short all the hard work wouldn't really pay off.

There is a historic part of town. I saw two house for sale in this area. They look cool and are inexpensive for the size. Which surprised me because homes like this in San Antonio cost a lot more. It seems like most people don't live in the older part of town, most have been moving to the newer areas.

Can you tell which one is my favorite? The interior looks like it needs some help. Hopefully someone will buy it and give it some love. Sadly it's not going to be us. 

We're most likely going to end up in the new part of town.

I'm kind of freaking out about moving to a new construction home. I've gotten so used to living in our 1930's cottage house I don't know what I'm going to do with myself. How will I know if the mailman is at the door if Gracie can't run under the house and bark at him (our house is pier & beam). Because our house is pier and beam it tends to shift with the changing weather. How boring will it be to always come home and not have to jiggle and shake the lock a different way each day? And what will I have to worry about with new non- leaky plumbing? And how can I dream about tearing out walls if the home already has an open floor plan?

Seriously we've put a lot of hard work into this house and we love it. We installed the insulation in the attic, replaced all the lighting, had cable run, painted all the walls, not to mention the kitchen remodel. And besides all the hard work this is where our first child was born- Con-Man! 

We've learned a lot and grown a lot in the short 3 years we've been here- no matter where we end up living in Altus I know we'll have even more good memories to share when we leave.

A Magic App

Oohh! A Magic I-phone App- I wonder what it does. Turn things into gold? Gives you a good hair day even when its 100% humidity outside? Wash all the dishes for you? No, unfortunately it doens't do any of those things but it's still pretty awesome.

It's actually called MagicPlan and it's for the IPhone 4. You can use it to draw up floor plans of your house or any room you want a floor plan of. And it's FREE!



It sounds almost to good to be true but here's how it works- just take a picture of each corner of your room and Magic Plan does the rest. It measure the walls and doors of the room and creates a plan based off the pictures you took.

If you want to do your whole house you just slide the rooms around into place and Magic Plan takes into account the wall thicknesses for you.

Sounds pretty amazing that you get a whole floor plan drawn just by taking pictures with your phone. I don't know how accurate it is; I don't know if I'd try to build a house off it. Especially if you have a lot of weird angles in your home. 

But it would be super helpful if your trying to plan furniture for your home. You could quickly and easily draw up a plan and you could see if that new couch your thinking of getting will fit in the space you want it to go. Use it to get a rough estimate for sqaure footage of material if your remoeling. If you have a rental property you could post the floor plan online for potential renters to view.

Has anyone used this App? I only have a lowly I-Phone 3G so I can't access it. Has anyone has found it helpful. Does it really work? Some of the reviews online have me curoius about it.

Should I run out and buy a 4G?

Coffee Table is Here Again!

I've been so anxious and excited the past few weeks I just can't contain it anymore! In just a few short weeks my MIL is coming in town for a whole week!! WOO HOO! 


What? You don't get this excited when your in-laws come to visit?


Well I do; for a few reasons. First of all she is super fun and awesome to hang out with. Second of all, she says she's coming to visit us but I really know she's coming to visit the Con-Man ;) Which is totally fine with me because this means that I will have chance to have some one on one time with my welder!


Those of you who haven't been around for a while (and those of you who have may not even remember) I started making this coffee table:

Like 6 months ago.... I had high aspirations to finish is in a timely manner but between my job, The Hubs job, and Con-Man I could never find enough time to work on it. I had finished one part of the table but it ended there.

But that's all going to change soon.

I need to decide what sort of wood I want for the top. The original tables I had looked at were made of reclaimed railroad ties. So I did some research around to and priced reclaimed wood. What I found was pretty pricey- one guy quoted $3 a board foot. So for a 12' board that's $36! And I would need 3 or 4 boards at least. Yikes!

It's so pretty though!

Of course I know with some work I can make wood look worn. And I do like the stain on this shelving from The Brick House:

I totally want to make one of these shelves one day. But that's neither here nor there- I have a coffee table to focus on.

So- in the next few days I'm going to scout out some wood. Maybe I'll get lucky and find someone tearing down a barn nearby. If not it's off to Home Depot I go. 

I'll keep you posted! Wish me luck!

For Mom~

Happy early Mother's Day to all the Mom's out there! Mom's are the best aren't they? 


For our Mom's we thought it would be fun for Con- Man to make something special for them. He worked hard painting Mother's Day Cards.

Great job Con-Man! Your Grandma's are going to love it!

And what was the hubs going to give me for Mother's Day? Well being as awesome as he is, he remembered that a few months ago I mentioned that I wanted this Metal Bender from Harbor Freight for Christmas.

Sadly he told me it has been on back order for a while now. I know it's not a typical present request but I had seen it first used on Logan's blog One Forty Three. He used it to make these awesome hairpin table legs!

He is my hero! I want to get as good as he is when it comes to furniture making. I have a long way to go but I think I'll have a lot of time to work on it after the big move to Altus.

So what did I end up getting for Mother's Day? I'll have to wait for tomorrow to find out! 

What are your plan's for Mother's Day?

To Tweet or Not to Tweet?

That is the question I was asking myself the other day. I read this article in Elle Decor about how Twitter can help boost your blog or business. They interviewed the amazing Grace Bonney, founder of Design*Sponge and talked with her about how she used Twitter to grow her brand. 


I think the article has a lot of good ideas and advice on how to tweet and what to tweet about.


For example one piece of advice I found most helpful was her rule of thirds. She suggests splitting you tweets between Promotional (like a project you just completed), personal ( ex- photographs) and content sharing (great ideas from other bloggers.)


I admit when I first started using Twitter I wasn't sure how it would help get people engaged with my blog. After reading the article I have a better idea of how I can be using Twitter to talk with people; though I still feel like I have a lot to learn. I've been trying to Tweet more often. You may have noticed that I added a Twitter feed to my blog so you can check out the action.

I do worry about tweeting to much since my Blog and Twitter are fed to my Facebook account. I don't want to drown my friends Facebook pages with blog posts and twitter tweets. (Please let me know if I am bothering you guys!)

So what are your thoughts on Twitter? Do you use it or don't see the point of it? Have you used it to grow your blog or business? Any advice?

Thirfty Weekend

There are a few thrift stores near our house that I like to frequent. This weekend I had some time to stop by a few of them. Technically I'm not supposed to be buying anything since we are moving. We are supposed to be getting rid of things around the house to make the move easier, but I can't help myself.


First I stopped by RetroMex. They have lots of authentic Mexican art and artifacts as well retro furniture.


I really liked their selection of chairs.


I had never seen a chair like this in rocker form:

These mid-century chairs caught my eye as well. (Sorry for the bad I-phone pics. I had Con-Man in one hand and phone in the other. :)

They had a bunch of these old cigarette holders from the days when everyone who was anyone smoked. They are pretty cool, I wonder what else you can use them for?

Cool glow-y lamp!

I saw this guy outside. It's one of the Fry Guys from McDonalds! Neat!

These planters are old tires cut up and painted. What a great reuse! 

The other place I stopped at isn't really a thrift store. It's called ABC Shelving. They mainly have old shelving they get from places that have gone out of business. I have been on the secret mission to find some lockers. (Don't tell the hubs- like I said I'm not supposed to be buying anything...) Sometimes they have some and I'm hoping to get my hands on them.

Besides old shelving they have other unique items.

Like this giant scale-

Interesting Wooden Shelves:

Mannequins anyone? (I told you they had a little bit of everything.)

What really caught my eye was this vintage drawer system. With some cleaning up and maybe a fresh coat of paint it could be a great place to hold DVD's or other knick knacks that find their way into our living room.

I was able to restrain myself even though I really considered those drawers. Must focus on the task on hand! Lockers!

Anyone else have some thrifty adventures this weekend?