Update about the DIY series!

Hi everyone!  I hope that you're all having a great day!  I wanted to let you know that I am working on the third installment of my DIY series!  I hope you are excited about it as much as I am!  I think you will love it because its something that will keep you organized and something that you can customize!  You can use it just for you and you can even get your kids to help you create it if you love doing crafts together!  They can even design their own.

Check out the blog again for the third installment!  Send me a tweet and let me know you're excited! :)

Xoxo-Brit.

DIY Accessories Holder/Organizer.

Hi everyone!  How are you all doing today?  I was traveling into the city today and it gave me inspiration for a blog post that you will see in the future but today is the second installment of my DIY series!  Today I want to talk to you all about organization.  When it comes to organizing things, I usually describe myself as "organized chaos" because when you come into my room, things are almost always ALL OVER THE PLACE, but I know where each thing is if you were to ask me!  Do you know what I mean?  Anyway!  I hope you can follow me and learn how to make my DIY Accessories Holder/Organizer.

Overview of the DIY Accessories Holder/Organizer.

 There are a few things that you'll need starting with a large piece of wood that will act as the back board for your organizer.  For this, you can use the same size as you used in the nail polish racks, 2ftx2ft.  The next thing you'll need is some wire so that you can wrap it around the corners and half way down the back board as seen in the photo.  You can get both of these things at Home Depot and if you need help, the people there will help you.  Like I said, being a girl in Home Depot is a severely unique experience.  Finally you will need cork material to put in the middle of your organizer to stick you earrings on, I got mine at JoAnn's Craft Store.  Aside from these essentials, you'll need a nail gun and make sure that you are CAREFUL with it!

The left corner.

The right corner.

This is extremely easy and affordable, like the nail polish rack and thats why I love it, so let's get started.  With the back board, lay out where you are going to want to put the wire in the corners.  You don't really need a ruler for this because you can measure them to your liking and they even can be different if you want them too on each side.  Once you are done, make sure you make the wire long enough so that it wraps to the back of the board and staple it there.  Sometimes it helps to staple it once, fold over the excess on the end and staple it again to make sure it stays there.  

Once you are done with the two corners, go ahead and decide where you want to put the wire in the middle of your board for (in my case, see the photos) the headbands.  Do the same thing that you have done for the wire on the top.  Measure, fold & staple and then fold & staple once again.  Once you are done with this, you could always add more wire on the sides if you would like, but for now I kept it with two on the top and one in the middle.

Now it is time for the cork board.  Like I said, I purchased my cork board at JoAnn's and it came in roll form.  I simply unrolled the cork and measured it to the size that I wanted.  As you can see in the photo, mine is basically right in the middle, about 1.5ft.  I like this size because it is absolutely huge and a large surface area.  There is a lot of room for a ton of post and dangly earrings.  I found it to work great when you put your dangly earrings on the bottom and the post at the top (although this is probably not a surprise to you).  As you can also see in the photo there are some dangly earrings that are hanging in the top left corner because they are some of the newer ones, I tend to put the newer ones higher.

Headbands.

Also, make sure when you are stapling the cork roll to the back board that you do two layers.  This will make sure that the earrings can stick through and will not fall when you peg them into the cork.  If you only do one layer of cork, they will not stay because the portion of the earring that goes through the ear is way too long.

As you can see, I have my bows on the left and some hair barrettes on the right.  The headbands are on the bottom and the earrings are in the middle.  The best part about this is that you can see everything!  I wanted something that displayed everything that I had for when I chose outfits in the morning, that way I don't rule anything out!  Being able to see everything that you own is a great way to incorporate all of your pieces into your outfits.

Feel free to round the edges if you'd like and decorate them to your hearts content.  Another great option for this is to add a small nail on the back that will support the weight of it and a ribbon to hang it on the wall.  I feel like this would add an adorable touch and make it such a cute fixture for either a little girls room or anyones bedroom!

Earrings.

That is all I have for you guys today!  I hope you really enjoyed this second installment of my DIY series, the DIY Accessories Holder/Organizer.  I love making these pieces because they are so personal and customizable while they are also  inexpensive and practical.

If you try this out or my first DIY piece, the Nail Polish Rack, please tweet me with a picture!  Thank you for reading as always.
Xoxo-Brit.

Rest In Peace, Steve.

Hi everyone.  Today is not going to be the normally scheduled post (the second installment of my DIY series) that I had intended to post.

Something happened today that I am not very happy about at all, it was a very difficult day.  A friend of mine, Steve Jackson passed away in a terrible car accident.  I spent the day at work with all of my friends and we grieved as much as we could together.  I stood there and shook the entire day, I held my friends hands while they cried.  We talked about memories of Steve and shared stories that we had about him to make each other feel better.  

I just cant stress enough how important it is to make sure that everyone is safe while driving.  Steve's accident was incredibly scary and caused by icy roads and other drivers involved, but that doesn't mean we all shouldn't be driving as safe as we possibly can.  

Rest in Peace, Steve.  We all love you forever.

Xoxo-Brit.

DIY Nail Polish Rack/Storage!

Hi everyone!  I hope you are all having a great day and weekend and are excited for this first installment of my DIY series.  I hope you will find some interesting things here and try to create them on your own.  The first thing I want to tell you all about is my oldest DIY project, my nail polish organizer which is quick, really easy, and super inexpensive.  Read on and enjoy!

Up against the wall, the two nail polish racks.

The reason why I made my own is because I was tired of searching for something online and in stores that would hold all of the nail polishes that I have (and that is a ton).  I am not joking, as you can tell in the photo it really was not easy to try and find something that would work for me.  Another reason for wanting to create my own nail polish holder is that everything I was seeing in stores and online didn't have a set-up that would display them so that I could see them.  The reason why I wanted to be able to see them is because I have so many and love them all.  I wanted to make sure that I could see them all, at all times.  Maybe I am way too obsessed, I just call it in love.

My first nail polish rack.

The first thing you are going to need is a 2ftx2ft flat piece of wood, this will make the back (and base) for the entire nail polish rack/holder.  You can definitely get a smaller size if you think you don't need this much room/space, or you can get a bigger one!  After you get the back of the holder, you are going to need smaller pieces of wood to make the shelves.  I picked up as 1inx3in that was about 6ft.  By doing this, you can have the people at Home Depot cut it into 2ft sections to use as the shelves.  You can find these at your Home Depot and can get someone to help you if you need it.  Sorry for this sidebar but I just wanted you all to know if you have never been in a Home Depot alone as a girl, you're in for a really interesting experience.  Every single time I go in here, 5,000 people ask me if I need help.  

As far as building materials, the only other things you are going to need are small nails, a hammer, a pencil to draw on your measuring marks, and a ruler/measuring tape.  

Showing you how to read the measurements.

Once you have everything that you are going to need it's time to start measuring things out.  My tip to you for doing this is to get one of each different kind of nail polish that you own.  When you are laying them down on the back piece of wood you want to make sure that the shelves are spaced out enough so that you can easily take on and off the nail polishes from the shelves.  Once you figure out where you want the shelves to be, mark this with the pencil.  Another tip is that you should always make sure that you space out all of your shelves, measure them, pencil them in, and then you can put them in place by nailing them to the backboard.  My father always said, "Measure twice, cut once..."

The second nail polish rack.

Basically, you are done!  All you need to do now is set your nail polishes on the shelves.  One of the only things that I would do different is add sides to this.  Right now I have my nail polishes displayed on the shelves without sides and it is perfectly fine, but adding them would just ensure that they are locked in a little bit better.  If you are going to do this, make sure you measure to add them in before you do the shelves that hold the polish.

If you need help cutting the wood, they should be able to do it for you at your Home Depot, that's what I ended up doing.  Big props to my dad for helping me out and putting it together.  With my design and my dads assistance a wonderful nail polish rack was made!  I told you this was super simple, I absolutely love it.  The best thing about this is that you can either attach another one to it on the side, or make another one.  As you can see, I made another one and they are both permanent fixtures to my room.  Another thing about these nail displays is that they look great and quite modern in your room.  The design with wood adds a little "homey-ness," it's really interesting and something new.

Leaning against the wall.

Another great thing about the design is that the shelves are a little bit bigger than the nail polish, I designed them this way.  The reason for this is that I figured there would be space for nail files and in some cases, a second row of nail polish that is not as big as other polishes.  The fact that you are able to see all of your polishes when trying to make a decision of which you'll use is great functionality.  As you can see, my polish rack is sitting on my desk, out of the way.  In another photo, you can also see that they lean against the wall or can be pushed up against the wall.  I love how elegant and modern-ish, you can put them anywhere.  Very cool!

If you guys try this, please tweet me a picture and show me.  I would love to see everyone recreate this DIY.  I also hope that you guys enjoyed the first installment of my mini DIY series.  Tune in tomorrow for the next post dealing with organization.  Thank you for reading.

Xoxo-Brit.

A DIY Series is announced!

Hey everyone!  I hope you are all having a great weekend.  I had work today for five hours and I didn't want to go, like normal.  Like I said yesterday, I hate the weekends now because I know that HR people aren't looking at my resumes and I just continuously wish for Monday to come again.  Only one more day!

I just wanted to make a quick post today with really no content in it to let you know that I am going to be doing another quick series on my blog regarding the DIY projects that I have done recently.  There are some really interesting things that I have done to organize my room and my products a little bit better and I really want to share them with you. 

 I spent a ton of time looking up online nail polish organizer/storage containers and I could never find something for mine.  Reason number one being that I have so much nail polish it's ridiculous and number two there was just nothing that I liked.  I was always a fan of the displays that nail salons had but it was always so expensive to have one shipped to me from wherever they come from and I was going to end up spending a ton of money between that and ordering probably 5 of them because I have that much nail polish.  With that being said, tomorrow will start my first installment of my DIY series with a DIY Nail Polish Holder/Display Rack.  I will talk more about why I wanted to make my own and why I made it the way I did.  I will show you photos and talk more about the whole project generally.

After tomorrows installment of my project, I will show you two other DIY projects that I really love.  I hope you guys come back and check it out tomorrow and I will talk to you then! :)  Send me a tweet and tell me whats up.

Xoxo-Brit.