Pallet Chicken Coop: Part Two

Things have been crazy busy around here. Between our attempts at starting a farm, my attempt at getting healthy, and all the things that the boys have had going on at school, I really haven't had any time to be creative or crafty! I seriously miss it...but sometimes everyday like comes first. Anyway, our chicken coop project is pretty much complete. The chickens are actually already living in it! These are some pics I took of the rest of our construction of the coop...I will try to add another post later this week with the run so that you can see the whole finished project. If you missed the first part you can check it out here: Pallet Chicken Coop: Part One. And I totally messed up on the name, so the first one says Pallet Chicken Coop and the second one says Project Chicken Coop....oops!

We used two glass front kitchen cabinet doors that we found at the Habitat for Humanity ReStore for the front windows of the coop. Jason cut two holes out of the front of the coop to accommodate the windows.

We added some cozy nesting boxes inside for the when the chickens are ready to lay eggs. I read online that the chickens like for it to be private and dark, so I'm thinking about maybe adding some burlap curtains at some point...it just depends on how much poop they get on everything:)

We added a tin roof with some sheets of corrugated metal.

Jason installed the windows using the hinges that were already attached to the windows.

We added some access doors on the back side of the coop behind the nesting boxes so that it would be easy for the boys to gather eggs.

This is what it looks like with the doors closed.

A closer look at the nesting boxes.Jason added a door on the side of the coop so we can clean it out and access the food and water that he put underneath the coop.

After the whole coop was built with the pallets, we went back and filled in all the gapes with pieces of plywood from the inside. It was pretty easy to do and covering the gapes makes sure that the chickens will stay nice and warm. After we were finished assembling we added all the finishing touches.

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I painted the whole coop with a mixture of lime and water...kind of like a whitewash effect. We added a door for the chickens to use made from a recycled kitchen door.

I painted the windows, doors, and some of the trim a bright yellow color. It was leftover from our patio project from a few years ago. 

I'll try to get one more shot of the finished project and share the other details that we added to the coop to make if really functional and hopefully really easy to maintain. 

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Pallet Chicken Coop: Part One

For about a year Jason and I have been talking about getting chickens. With a house full of growing boys, we needed to find some easy ways to cut down on our grocery bill. A garden is on our list of to do's for this spring, and I figured if we were going to be farmers we might as well add a little livestock into the mix too! I did a lot of research online, and I feel in love with the idea of a pallet chicken coop. One because pallets make the cutest stuff....and two because pallets are free which means our project would be way cheaper than if we bought all new supplies at the hardware store.

We started our adventure with a trip to the Habitat for Humanity ReStore. Our original intention in going to the ReStore was to look for electrical fixtures and old kitchen cabinet doors. I had seen a suggestion online to use glass front cabinet doors as window for the coop, and I figured the ReStore was the best place to look for something like that. We ended up with a couple of glass front kitchen cabinet doors and a truck load of FREE pallets! Jason picked up some extra lumber at the hardware store and then we headed home to start building.

We decided on a layout and measured how big the base for the coop needed to be. Jason started the base with four 4X4 posts for the corners. Then he attached them together with 2X6's to make a rectangle.

 We used some scrap plywood from another project as the floor...and we got a little help from the kiddos!

 After the base was made, Jason dug holes for the four posts to sit in. We picked up the base and sat it down into the holes, and then let the kids fill in the holes with the extra dirt.

 The next step was to build the walls. Our coop ended up being three pallets across. Jason just laid them down and attached the three pallets together with extra wood strips from other pallets.

 We had plenty of pallets, so some of them {the ones with broken slates or missing nails} got used for parts.

The design we decided on was a back wall that was one pallet high and a front wall that was one and a half pallets high. After we had the front wall put together, the top edge of the pallets were trimmed so that they could be stacked.

 After the walls were trimmed, we put the walls into place and attached them to the base with lots and lots of nails. Here is a picture of the back wall in place:

 It turns out that pallet wood is actually really good quality...which means it is HARD! Which means you need a lot of muscle and a little bit of patience to get nails to actually go into the wood! We had quite a few bent nails laying around during this project:)

 And here is a picture with the partial front wall in place:

 Here is a side view of the coop with the base and walls up:

Check back next week for part two...we get the rest of the walls up, add doors and nesting boxes, and I paint the whole thing!

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Pallet and Hay Christmas Display

I never thought that back in August when I asked Jason to bring an old pallet home from work, that I would still be using it in December! That one pallet has gone from Barynyard Party to Fall Display to Christmas picture backdrop, and now I'm using it in my Pallet and Hay Christmas Display! It has been one of the most versatile outdoor decorations I've every had...and it was basically free except for the embellishments that I added to it! 

To dress the pallet up for Christmas, I turned it 180 degree so that the fall saying was at the bottom {that way I can use it again next year}. Then I added a Christmas Bible verse to the top with some vinyl that I cut with my Silhouette. I would recommend using outdoor vinyl, but if you don't have any {like I didn't} you can use regular vinyl and then spray a really good coating of clear sealer over the letters after you stick them to the pallet. At night our Mary, Joseph, and Baby Jesus light up, so I kind of want to add a light up star to the display somehow but I haven't quite figured it out yet!

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Pallet and Hay Fall Display

So I've been a little absent from the blog world lately, mostly because things have been really busy around here...but also because I feel like I've lost a little bit of my creativity. I thought when Eli started preschool two days a week, that I would have a ton of time to do some crafting, creating, and decorating. But so far that hasn't happened. Instead my house is a wreck, my craft room is still nonexistent, and I can not for the life of me keep up with the laundry! Despite all of that {and sorry for my whining, but surely I'm not the only one feeling like this right now!?!}, I did manage to get a few fall decorations put up last week. I created this fun outdoor display from a few things leftover from Eli's Barnyard Brunch birthday party along with some of my usual fall decorations and a some things from a local nursery. 

 I think my favorite part of this whole display is the fun pallet with the vinyl saying. This is the same pallet that was the backdrop for the food table at Eli's party. I had already added the whitewash effect, which I thought was very fun and fallish. But it needed something a little more, so I broke out my Silhouette and cute out the cute Happy Fall, Y'all saying. I think it adds a ton of whimsy to the display! The best thing about it is that if I want to use this pallet again for something else, all I have to do is peel off the vinyl!

I also love the look of the funky pumpkins stacked together. I originally had a triple stack of pumpkins and another cute orange one, but the Mississippi heat was too much for the pumpkins and I ended up with some gross rotten pumpkin soup. I managed to salvage the two in the picture, but I don't think they are going to last much longer either....I'm starting to see the beauty of the fake, crafty pumpkins:) I threw in a couple of mums to complete the whole fall look, and I think it turned out pretty cute! 

Do you put any fall decorations outside?

{And do your pumpkins still look perfect, or do you have rotten pumpkin soup like me?!?}

HGTV.com feature

A few weeks ago,  I got an email from a writer for HGTV.com asking if they could feature my Outdoor Toy Organizer in an article on the HGTV.com website.

To say that I was excited would be a major understatement!
I love watching HGTV and I love browsing HGTV.com for awesome ideas....so knowing that one of my projects would be featured there was such an honor. I got an email today saying that the article was up and I was so excited that I just had to share it here with y'all! The article is called Clever Uses for Everyday Items in the Garage. I know my original project was for outdoors, but honestly it would work even better inside a garage! Here's a little preview of what the article is about straight from HGTV.com:

Upcycled decor is smart and savvy, so why save all the best ideas for inside the home? We've gathered clever redos from inspired DIYers with a talent for giving new life to old things that are perfect for the garage.

I would love for you to hope over to HGTV.com and check out the article. I know you have all seen my Outdoor Toy Organizer before, but there are also a ton of other great ideas that are perfect for organizing your garage or outdoor space...just in time for spring cleaning too! 

Pinterest Inspiration: Football Door Hangers

My craft {and recipe, decorating, photography, holiday, and party} to do list keeps getting longer and longer...mostly thanks to Pinterest! I am seriously pinning amazing ideas way faster than I can create them! A few weeks ago I pinned a really cute Football Door Hanger that I knew would be perfect on my front porch along with my Football Windsocks! I had all the supplies in my craft stash, I just kept putting off making them...until I finally convinced a few of my friends to come over for a craft day! We spent a few hours turning plain burlap into these adorable Football Door Hangers:

I don't have a step by step for you...mostly because I was dealing with Eli and trying to make four of these without getting too confused! {Check out Amanda's blog post to see her step by step.} They are actually really easy to make. We started by cutting out some plain burlap in the shape of a football, two footballs per door hanger. Then we spray painted one side of each burlap football with brown spray paint. After the paint was dry we added the fun painted embellishments to the piece that was going to be the front. You can also paint on two of the burlap footballs and make it reversible. My friend Tonya is apparently a great free-hand painter so she did the letters:) After the paint was dry, we layered two of the footballs together and then used a stapler to attach them to each other leaving one end open to stuff them. We added in a ribbon to the top to hang them with, stuffed them with plastic grocery bags, and closed up the hole using the stapler. Pretty easy and SUPER cute! That's one project I can mark off my {Pinterest} to do list!

Have you been working on any Pinterest inspired projects lately?

Football Windsocks

Early this week, I confessed that my front porch was still decked out with patriotic decor even though we are halfway through September. So yesterday I got busy making my porch a little more festive for football season instead of the 4th of July! I knew that I loved the look of my Tin Can Windsocks, and I wanted to put something up in their place...and what could be better than some windsocks made to look like FOOTBALLS!

I started with the same supplies as my 4th of July version: old formula cans, spray paint, ribbon, white contact paper, and twine. I cleaned out the cans, dried them really well, and then sprayed them with a good coat of brown spray paint.

After the paint dried, I brought them inside to decorate with white contact paper. I cut one inch wide strips of contact paper long enough to go all the way down the side of the can. Then I cut 3/4 inch strips that were about 3 inches long to make the cross stitches. I used 2 of the longer pieces and 6 of the shorter pieces per can so that I had a "football" on two sides of the can.

This is where this project gets really fun, because now you can personalize them to show your team spirit! I used maroon and white ribbon because we spend most of the year cheering for the Mississippi State University Bulldogs...plus the boys' school colors are maroon and white too! I think these would be really cute with almost any team color combo...blue and orange for Auburn, purple and gold for LSU...whatever team you cheer for! I cut my ribbon into 12 inch lengths and then hot glued them inside the can alternating the two colors.

After you add your ribbon, make two holes in the top of the can with a screwdriver and hammer. Then feed your twine through to make a hanger for your windsock.

Hang your Football Windsocks proudly on your front porch and then get ready to cheer on your favorite team!

How do you decorate for {or celebrate} football season?

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Ugly Patio Box to Cute Outdoor Seating

We bought a patio box a few years ago to store all the boys outside toys. At the time it was really functional for keeping all their toddler riding toys, sand buckets, and their Fisher Price Bubble Mower in one place instead of all over the yard. We even used it as a seat sometimes, but over the years our patio box took a beating. It even had a hole in the top that I'm pretty sure came from a baseball bat. So when I started our patio makeover I knew something had to be done to our old neglected patio box.

The first thing I had to tackle was the big hole in the top of the lid....and it was duct tape to the rescue! I simply used stripes of duct tape on the outside and inside of the lid to seal up the hole.

 I bought a piece of foam and cut it to size with a bread knife...I've also heard an electric knife works well for cutting foam, but I was too lazy to dig ours out of the back of the kitchen cabinet:) After removing the lid from the box, I sprayed the lid with spray adhesive and stuck my cut to size piece of foam on it. Then I sprayed the top of the foam with spray adhesive. I placed the fabric upside down on the ground and carefully positioned the foam/lid onto the fabric.

 Using screws and my hubby handy drill, we attached the fabric to the lid after wrapping the fabric around the outside edge of the lid. I wasn't sure how a screw would work on the plastic lid, but after we found the right kind of screw it was no problem at all. I have no idea what kind of screw we used, just that some of the ones that we had wouldn't work:)

 This is what the inside of the lid looked like after I finished attaching the fabric and foam. If you try this make sure that you pay attention to where the hinges are so that you don't cover them up with fabric. My hinges where on the right side in the picture below which is why it looks different than the other three sides.

I impatiently waited for Jason to get home from work so he could reattach the lid for me. I tried a few times but couldn't figure it out:) Once the lid was in place, we had a great new seating area on our patio!

You can check out the rest of our patio makeover here!

Patio Makeover Reveal

After more than a month of work, I'm finally sharing our patio makeover with you {even though I still have two more projects to do for this to be complete}! I don't have a before picture mostly because our before patio was really sad...no shade, a rusty old table, and way too many toys crammed in one place! Now it is this bright and cheery space that I love!

This whole project started because I wanted to add a little more shade to our backyard so the boys would be a little cooler playing in the backyard during the SUPER hot summer! We added the pergola a few years ago, but it never really gave us the shade that we were hoping for. So I hit the fabric store during an awesome outdoor fabric sale and bought a ton of fabric. I cut the fabric into strips {and hemmed each edge to keep it from fraying} then Jason weaved the fabric in and out of the braces of the pergola attaching it to the pergola with staples along the top edge.

Not only did the fabric add a ton of color to the space, but it created just the right amount of shade over the back patio without seeming like a full roof over it. We also added some outdoor lighting to the pergola so we can use it more at night too.

After all that color was added to the pergola, I decided we needed a new table with a little color too. We traded out our old rusty table for a new picnic table that is much more functional for little kids. The table came unfinished {we got it at Lowe's for less than $100} and I painted it with a coat of primer and then a coat of {Honeypot from Valspar I think} exterior paint.

To add just a little more color to the patio area, I also painted out white back door with the same yellow color.

Two of our old chairs got a new coat of black spray paint and I recovered the cushions with some of the scraps of outdoor fabric that I used on the pergola.

I've already shared out Outdoor Toy Organizer...

...and my old window turned outdoor wall art.

I also gave our old {and half way broken} patio box a makeover as well. It went from this:

to this:

{I'll share the step by step on how I turned this old patio box into a really cute bench tomorrow.}

We picked up a new light fixture for over the back door and I am still working on a chandelier creation to hang over the picnic table, but for now I am really pleased with how our new patio looks!