Placemat Pillow Tutorial

While shopping at Target for a few accessories for my living room, I came across these SUPER cute placemats. I noticed that the placemats were fully lined, meaning they were two pieces of material sewn together with a nice finished edge. The first thing that came to mind was that they would make great {and cheap} pillows!
I bought two placemats. They were on sale for $3.75 each! I also picked up a 16 oz bag of Cluster Stuff {the white fluffy stuff used to fill pillows} for $4.50.

To get started, I checked around all four edges of the placemat and found the seam they used to turn the placemat. If you look carefully you should see that there is about a 2-3 inch place where the stitching is a little different.
Then I used my seam ripper to pull the thread and make a hole in the side of the placemat. Make sure that the hole is big enough to stick your hand in to make it easier to stuff.
Then I filled up my placemat turned pillow with the Cluster Stuff. One 16 oz. bag was just enough to stuff both of my placemats.
Then I used my sewing machine to stitch up the side of the new pillow. You could also easily do this with just a needle and thread.
I think they looks great on my new couch.
And they were a great deal too! I got two pillows for only $12.oo!

I'm linking up with these awesome parties:

Not My Child! Monday

This week I am mixing it up a little and doing Not My Child! Monday, a fun little twist on our weekly confessions of all our mommyhood shortcomings and oh-so-embarrassing incidents. This week I get to confess all the NOT so great things that my kids have done.....so go check out My Charming Kids to see all the things everyone else {& maybe their kiddos} has NOT been doing!

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Eli does NOT have a love of buckets, NOT specifically buckets on his head. He has NOT been cultivating his love of buckets since September of last year. I do NOT think it is SUPER cute and adorably funny, so I do NOT take pictures of him eveytime I catch him with a bucket on his head!

While on our way out to lunch a few weeks ago, I did NOT let Grant chose where we went to eat. The conversation did NOT go something like this:

Grant: I want to go to the place with the wheelbarrow in its' name.

Me: {totally confused}

Grant: You know the one by Target with the wheelbarrow in its' name.

Me:{ still totally confused}

Grant: That one! {pointing as we pass by Cracker Barrel}

Me: Oh, now I get it:)

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Thanks so much to everyone for entering this weeks FREE 4 All Friday. I used random.org to pick a winner, and the winner is: Bridget!

Also, go check out my Applique Towel Tutorial that is being featured over on Tip Junkie today:)

FREE 4 All Friday!

This giveway is closed.Congrats to Bridget!
It's the fourth Friday of the month.That means it's my turn to host FREE 4 All Fridays! Because everybody likes free stuff, right!?! *******************Somehow this Friday managed to sneak up on me. I'm sure it has nothing to do with my SUPER busy life...and trying to be SUPERMOM!
Lucily I have a few goodies in my stash!
This week I am giving away a ton of cute office stuff.

a pencil holder

notecards @ envelopes

grocery list notepad

3 elastic book bands

and

a dry erase board

To enter:
Leave a comment, any comment.
For another entry, follow my blog and leave me a comment telling me that you do.
For a third entry, place my blog button on your blog and then leave a comment telling that you did.
Follow me on twitter, and leave a comment telling me that you do.
For one more entry, stop by Mimi's place and tell her "HI" too!
I will use random.org to pick a winner on Sunday! Good Luck and thanks for entering!

Going a Little Green

Today is Earth Day, so I figured today would be a perfect day to share a new earth friendly product that I just discovered {and fell in love with}. I came across some of the coolest lunch boxes ever a few weeks ago, and I just had to buy some for my boys.

THE GOODBYN

{click on the name to check out their website}

Besides all the great selling point:

{100% recyclable}

{dishwasher safe}
{no plastic bags needed}
{made in the USA}

&

{SUPER adorable}

They also come in all three of my boys' colors {blue, green, and orange}!

The lunch box is divided into sections, so you don't need plastic baggies to send carrots and crackers, or almonds and cucumbers. Plus it comes with a juice bottle, so I can stop buying those expensive individual drinks! Each Goodbyn comes with a roll of 275+ adorable stickers.
I decorated each of my boys' Goodbyns with their name and a few other stickers {I didn't want the outside to be covered with a ton of stickers}. But I am going to let them decorate the juice bottle however they want:)
So far, I have been very impressed with the Goodbyn, and Henry is loving his new lunchbox! Grant and Eli will get to try theirs out this summer when we take picnics to the park.
Happy Earth Day! Do something GREEN!
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{I bought these SUPER adorable lunchboxes with my own money, and I did not receive any compensation for sharing it on my blog. I really do love this product and I simple wanted to share it with all of you!}

Wordless Wednesday: A Work in Progress & A Decorating Dilemma

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We are working on redoing our living room...which includes a new couch, a new arrangement, fresh {but not a new color} paint, new blinds, some furniture makeovers, new wall hangings, and some new accessories.

For the most part the redo is going great, but the accessories are giving me a little trouble. So today I am linking up with Decorating Dilemmas hosted by Amanda!

So here is my dilemma:

This is a candle holder that is made to look like an old sugar mold. I love it, but it is in need of a makeover. As you can tell, my monkeys {mainly Eli} have gotten their little hands on the candles and broken three of them. That means I need a new idea of what to put in the candle holder. I also think the color could use a facelift as well. Any tips or ideas are greatly appreciated!

Shutter Love: Balloons

A Great Anytime Snack

After Henry's Camp Out birthday party last week, I found that we had an abundance of graham crackers in the house. Mostly because the boys at the party loved to just eat the marshmallows right off their roasting sticks:) So most of the marshamallows didn't even make it onto the graham crackers!

Because we had a ton of graham crackers and no marshmallows to make s'mores, I decided to make the next best thing! I smeared a ton of peanut butter onto my graham crackers...
...I sandwiched two graham crackers together... ....and I had one of the yummiest anytime snacks ever!
Sometimes the simpliest things are the best:)
Have a great day, and don't forget to enjoy the simple things!

Not Me! Monday

Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival was created by MckMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week.
******************************** Today is NOT my hubby's 30th birthday. There is NO way that he is turning 30 today, because that means in two short months I will be turning 30 also! I am NOT just a little freaked out about the fact that our 20's are gone...though I know that getting older is better than the alternative:)
I am NOT making a surprise cake for my hubby's birthday using 30 of these:
This will NOT be one of the few times when it will be okay to eat 'birthday cake' for breakfast!

We did NOT decide very last minute to buy a few gallons of paint and repaint our living room. We did NOT have just a few accidents while attempting to repaint the living room. Those accidents did NOT include Jason shaking a not completely closed container of paint and splashing it all over the kitchen. Eli also did NOT do this:

{ with a used paint roller} all over the carport and down the driveway!

What have you NOT been doing this week?