Vinyl Table Cloth Runners

 

Here's a little color inspiration....Don't these colors just scream SPRING! They also scream "S.R.'s BIRTHDAY PARTY IS NEXT SATURDAY!!!! I can't wait for her party. There are so many cutesy things out there for little girls and their special days. As I said in a previous post, we are doing a butterfly theme for her party. I have been buying little by little over the past two months, and I have found some really cute stuff. I have been trying to figure out what I was going to do as far as table-scapes(yes, it's one of those kind of parties, and yes I am one of those mothers:oP) I was at Ross the other day perusing their Easter stuff and ran across this vinyl table cloth for $4.99

 

Personally, I really didn't want to go the vinyl route only b/c I like a little "fancy" in my parties, but then I came to my senses and realized that there are going to be 2 & 3 year olds running around like little precious "crazies" in my house. OF COURSE vinyl is a good idea! I am doing things on the cheap, so I wasn't going to buy 5 table cloths...so I thought, why not table runners? A friend of mine is donating some tables of hers that are just the right height for the little rug-rats, so there wasn't any need for a full size table cloth. Especially when little ones jerk those sorts of things right off a table:o) So anyway, I was able to get 5 runners out of one table cloth:o) Here's how I did it....

 
 

I spread the table cloth out on the floor. 

 

There are rounded edges, and I new I didn't have the patience to round each corner, so....

  

I cut them off:o)

 

I cut them to the length I needed for each individual table, but they are all 13" wide(except for one and it's 12" wide). I then took them to my sewing machine and sewed a zig zag stitch around the perimeter.

 

I didn't get right on the edge just b/c this is plastic and I didn't want the edges splitting from one another. Just enough to hold the cotton backing to the vinyl.

 

And there ya have it. Pretty simple, and very inexpensive. The decorations that are on the table runner are some things that we will be decorating with. The butterfly stands came from the Dollar Tree. 

 

The centerpiece I made using flowers & a butterfly from Hobby Lobby(which are 50% off right now), and some floral Styrofoam from Dollar tree. I already owned the clay pots. Just brought them in, and gave them a good washin'. I hope that I have brought a little spring in your day:o)

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I HAVE BEEN FEATURED ON U CREATE!!! They are featuring New Craft Blogs every couple of days, and I am SUPER pumped about having Fussy Monkey Buisness on such a popular blog...THANK YOU U CREATE!!!

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Tomorrow is the big announcement for my next giveaway...stay tuned!!!!!

 

Re-upholstered Chair

Many of you have seen this chair, but I thought that I would share the story behind it. I am in L-O-V-E with garage sales. I love the thrill of the hunt. Finding a treasure for next to nothing sends me over the top:o) This chair was one of those finds. When I found this chair, we were in the process of deciding whether to build a new house or add on to our existing home. So of course I had to start looking for more furniture...even though we had no idea what we were doing yet;o) Anyway, it was a beautiful Saturday morning, I am out dying to find something and there it was...the chair. I walked past it once, then again, saw the price and said to myself, "Ain't happenin'", then walked past one more time and then asked the seller, "will you take $25 for it?" And of course you know they did b/c now I own the sucka:o) They helped me load it in my van(yes, I own a van and you would too if you knew what was best for you...I haul EVERYTHING in that bad boy)
Well we decided to build a new house, so the chair went to storage for 4 months. When we moved into our dream home, we definitely needed some furniture. This house is a tad bigger than our last house. I couldn't wait to have the chair in the living room. The only problem was, I needed to recover it, as you can see below.

 

The fabric was dingy and worn in some places. I found some great upholstery fabric at Hancock Fabrics for $6 a yard. It took 8 hours to take this chair apart. I couldn't believe how many staples were in this thing!!! It only took 3 hours to put it back together...thank goodness:o) It was a lot easier to do than I thought. I love that the hubs has a pneumatic(I think that's what he calls it??) nail gun. That is my new favorite toy:o) Here's the finished chair:

 

  

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Remember to email in some pictures of projects that you have completed so that I can post them on Feature Friday's. Also, I will be posting a GREAT GIVE AWAY on Friday for followers only...Stay Tuned!!

What can I do when bully by the Big Boys ?

Some of the most read articles here is when some of the big finance institutions' bad intentions are exposed.

Credit Card companies will charge interest on the expenses you haven't even made yet

EPF does not really take good care of your money, not all the time

Bank can charge you 2200% interest in 1 month

Malaysia government try to solve credit card debt by adding more debt to it

Bursa Malaysia tells you NOT to invest long term

How Banks call center abuse users

Government allows citizen to reduce EPF and then use Tax to take away even more of people's money

Like wise, Robert's "Conspiracy" and a few other gurus who talked about how sick today's finance systems are, also receive major big hits. Its just fun, eye opening and jaw dropping to learn these news!

So what can we do about it ? Robert's suggestion is to join the big boys playing the debt game and his instrument is property investment. Obviously that is not the 'solution'. That is just him sharing what he does best. Unfortunately property investment is NOT an instrument that can be used by mass market ( everyone ). Just take a statistic of all Robert's subscribers and see how many get what they want. Do pay attention to his early franchisees results.

One of the concepts preached by this site is Scoping. For example;

It is important to understand that Income is a pre-requisite of Personal Finance but NOT a part of it. Hence it does NOT matter how much you earn, you should have a good Personal Finance Profile.

Following that same scope, it doesn't matter how RICH a person is, he may lost everything if he does not have a solid personal finance concept.

Personal Finance is personal, its NOT economy, its NOT company finance etc. Its just You.

So no matter what is happening around you, if it didn't affect you. You just read, learn and have some fun cursing them. If some of the big boys did bully you, stay cool, play victim contacting them and minimize damage as soon as possible before stay away for good.

It may sound sad or passive but its really not. Its just about being smart and get things done. When the big boy forces you to pay RM50 credit card fee, you can stop the credit cards. When EPF wants to scam your home loan money, you can choose lump sum payment. When government tricks your EPF, you can submit request to continue contribute maximum. It is as straight forward as that.

Get the scope right that your personal finance is all about you. Do something for yourself first. Then when you still feel like wanting to do more for the greater self. Then by all mean, gather a group, sign a petition, run a parade whatever etc. But that is NOT your personal finance duty. Its the greater you. Don't let the greater you ruin your personal finance. Because the journey of greater you is long and tedious. You will need multiple recharges before you reach the end of the journey. And keeping the scope clear will allow your personal finance to comfort and pamper you along the journey.

Boy's Beach Themed Room

I know that I have been all about some girly stuff here lately, but I do remember that I have a little boy. For all you mom's who need a little inspiration in all things boy, here ya go...This was my son's room in our last house, Over-The-Top Beach Theme...I haven't started on his room in the new house yet, but the wheels have definitely been turning. As soon as S.R.'s birthday party is over, E. is gonna get some love;o) Here are a few pics of his old room..when his mother actually paid him some mind...

 

The mural was painted by a lady that attended church with us...isn't she "Tha Bomb"??? My mother actually visited a model home and they had this same mural displayed in one of the children's bedrooms. "Tha Bomb" was able to use the picture that my mother gave me and copy it backwards to make the Woody face the right direction in E's room. I'm tellin' ya, she's awesome!

  

I painted the wave, and I'm not nearly as talented as my friend who painted the Woody, but it served it's purpose.  The quilt at the end of the bed, I made. It is a knock-off of a PBK quilt. I went to the nearest thrift store and bought a bunch of Hawaiian themed shirts. I cut them all up and pieced them together.

  

The grass skirt window treatment was actually a bedskirt for a twin bed that I cut up and hot glued to a wooden frame that the hubs constructed. 

 

The art work on the wall came from the internet. Just printed them off and put them is some frames that we already owned. This room was actually THE selling point for our house. The couple who purchased our home had been married in Hawaii...how cool is that:o) I hope that you have found some inspiration!

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Participating in:

Small Buffet Redo

 

All I have to say is THANK YOU Krylon Cherry Red! I truly had forgotten how much fun it was to spray paint furniture. Back in the day, that was my method of choice...how could I forget how much fun it was?!?! Anyway, my inspiration came from All Things Thrifty, a blog on how to re-purpose shabby furniture and make it fabulous. Thanks to Brooke for pointing me in the right direction!! 

I had a serious color issue (or should I say the lack there of?) in a corner of my living room. Too many wood tones...wooden chairs, wooden buffet, wooden floors, and wood toned accessories...So Very Blah! It has been driving me CRAZY for weeks, but I didn't know what to do until I saw the hutch on A.T.T. Here's the before...

 

A close up

 

Even closer..YIKES! Can you tell how old this thing is:o)

  My mother gave me this piece a few years ago. She was going to trash it just because the thing is falling apart(as you can very well see). I saved it from being disposed of, and didn't do a thing to it because I always dreamed of taking it to the Antiques Roadshow and them offering me a million bucks for it. After many years of watching that show, I finally realized that they would probably laugh in my face and tell me that I should have let my mother throw it in the first dumpster she came to:o) 

I am so glad that I became brave enough to paint this. It looks so much better!

 

You can see the details so much better now that it's in a brighter color

 

She needed a little BLANG-BLANG, so I busted out the Gold paint

 

I always feel good about a project when I get an, "Oh, Wow!" from the hubs, and there isn't a bit of sarcasm in his voice..haha! There are still some accessorization issues. But these will do for now...

 

  

Be on the look out for an upcoming give-away. More details to follow soon!

CHMC is part of the problem not the solution

I'm back and I am not happy....about losing to the US in hockey and about the CHMC.

I cant do much about the hockey, except complain that they should have had Luongo in the net.

However we are having more success with the CHMC. The mainstream media is finally waking up to what we have been saying in the blogosphere for years. The CHMC is distorting the housing (and lending) market and is a huge added liability the tax-payer does not need.

Here's a good summary which many of you may have already read:

http://housing-analysis.blogspot.com/2010/02/cmhc-canadas-moral-hazard-corporation.html

$480 Billion in insured mortgages is an astronomical amount for a small country like ours! What is the Government thinking?? Are our politicians that numerically challenged?

We better hope that housing doesn't collapse or we will all be in deep....

$480 Billion would be $4.8 Trillion for a country the size of the US. It is almost as much as our national debt: http://www.debtclock.ca/

Now of course it isn't all at risk, but once again I say (for the hundredth time)...TO CONTINUE INSURING LOW DOWN-PAYMENT/HIGH LEVERAGE Mortgages WHEN

1) Housing is at all time highs in many parts of the country

2) Interest rates are at all time lows

IS JUST PLAIN STUPID. If there are any fiscally prudent politicians out there please stop this time-bomb.

Think about it...if you were going to buy a used car with next-to-nothing down and poor credit history, you go to one of many 'bad credit, no credit, no problem' lenders and they arrange a high-interest loan and you get the keys.

BUT THE TAX-PAYER DOESN'T INSURE IT!

There is a fear of changing anything in Canada, even when we have seen it fail south of the border.

Remember Canwest begging for a bail-out or newspapers and TV stations would all close down. The Conservatives were, in my opinion, very close to giving them some of your money.

But there was a grass roots revolt and they backed off, and now some channels have been bought by employees, others have been bought by Shaw and the newspapers will stand or fall depending on their locals markets.

The world did not end.

A moratorium on the CHMC will not end the property market.

There is no right to own a home. It is not a bad idea, if you want to and if you can afford it and if you assume the risk.

If you cant afford it, and we assume the risk. DONT OWN.

I dont own and I don't feel deprived. Lets spend those billions on better education and free food for poor kids which is something that is a right, in a reasonable society.

I am now going to put my head in the freezer for a few minutes to cool down.

Pencil Art

Our anniversary was at the beginning of this month, so a gift was in order. The hubs is a HUGE 'Bama fan. He has his own office in our new home, and has started with the Alabama theme. (It isn't tacky...yet;o)) He has one of those stained glass lamps with a Bama emblem on it(which was very expensive, thank you in-store credit). I plan on buying some hounds tooth fabric and making him some curtains. Anywho, I really wanted to get him an Alabama print for our anniversary.... have you seen how much those puppies cost? Outrageous! So anyway, I thought that I would try to draw something for him, since I used to be a fairly good artist. I have always been able to copy cartoon art, but had never been able to draw living objects. I couldn't ever get the shading right..

I decided I would try to draw an elephant. I wanted the ears to be flared, so I hopped on the internet and typed in Elephant. The first elephant I came to had his ears flared, so boom there ya go, off to the printer Mr. Elephant...our printer was out of yellow ink, so the printer informed me that we can only print in black...that was the best thing that could have happened. Since the picture was in black and white, I was able to pick up all the high lights and low lights. In about 2 hours I had the picture drawn, and was SO EXCITED about it. My little precious monkeys kept jabbing at it with their little paws and moma was about to go ape on 'em. I had to hide it for a few days until I could figure out what I was going to do about a frame. Square frames are a lot more expensive, and I am too cheap to have it framed. One night, while laying in bed, I remembered that I had a print that I wasn't going to use since it no longer matched my decor. And guess what, it was in a square frame..SCORE! I had to physically rip that sucker out b/c someone got a little glue crazy at the picture factory. After all of that, I was able to get the elephant in his final resting place. When anniversary time came, I couldn't wait and gave it to the hubs before he headed into work. He was so impressed that he had to hang it immediately:o)