Thursday, May 31, 2012

Upcycled Necklace Organizer

I've been on the hunt to find something to hang my necklaces from. I'm kinda picky so I didn't want it to take up a lot of space, be too "themed", be in the way, able to be knocked over....   Really this list could go on and on.  

Then I saw it on Pinterest one day. Hang it on the wall!! Brilliant, but I don't have nearly as many necklaces as she has, nor did I have all those wooden trim pieces and I didn't want to go buy them, so I just looked for something that I already had. 

 Since we were making some flooring changes (not by want, but by need, think FLOOD) I had a piece of floor moulding hanging out, just waiting for the trash can. This is pressed together board for laminate flooring, not actual real hard wood, but I think that would work too. 
This is a transition piece so there is a lip area on the back.  My piece looks like this from the back. 
I ran over to Lowe's and picked up a package of white furniture nails, yep already painted! There are 25 in the package so I only needed to get one! 25 furniture nails for $1.30, Free Floor Moulding and I had some white spray paint already, so this ended up being a CRAZY cheap project for me. 

All I did was spray paint the board with a couple coats of paint and let it dry. I tried to hammer in some brackets on the back to hang it from but this type of wood is HARD and I actually broke more than one getting them in. Then of course once I had them  pounded in and hung it on the wall, it stuck out pretty far from the wall and tipped forward. So I just ended up drilling a couple holes in the back at an upward angle with my DeWalt drill. This really helped snug it up to the wall so I could use that little space as a shelf for pins or pendants. 

(Total after thought, even though the inspiration had a "shelf" area I didn't think that mine would be able to be used like that so I was originally going to hang it with the space down)

Once the paint dried and I had the "hanger" dilemma figured out, I just measured my piece and figured out the spacing for my tacks and drilled holes with my DeWalt drill and DeWalts 1/16" Titanium drill bits. I really needed to pre-drill these holes, there was no way that I could hammer them in and get them in the "spots" that I needed. After I drilled the holes I put the furniture nails in, gave them a little "stay put" tap with the hammer and up it went.



I absolutely love it. It's everything I wanted easy to get to yet out of the way and will still look great if I change the decor in my room!!  Plus it was almost No out of pocket and I'm able to say Yep I made that!!
I still LOVE the original inspiration unit so much that I may "upgrade" one day!!

Thanks for reading my post, I hope you've been inspired to make something out of materials that may otherwise ended up in a landfill. 

Pretty Cord Organization With Duck Tape

I know most of us have seen this done before but I think it's such a great idea!!  


Us girls usually have at least 1 or 2 or MORE, corded items in the bathroom, whether it's curling iron, flat irons, hairdryer or all of the above. 

So do I, and I HATED the cord mess. 



I hated wrapping the cord around my curling iron so much that it's now in a permanent spiral. The tangled mess that you couldn't just pull out one item at a time. They all came pouring out of my cabinet in a big mess.  Not a very fun way to spend the morning or while trying to get ready for a night on the town.  

I knew what needed to be done, the cute toilet paper rolls to the rescue. The only hard thing was to decide on a Duck Tape pattern that I loved (and could find). Seems like all the patterns that I've seen this done with before were no where to be found, so I put the project off. Until my latest trip to Hobby Lobby, I found this super cute happy floral print. It's more of an aqua color, which I LOVE, it's one of their newest prints called "Blue Surf". 


So I saved a few empty toilet rolls, cut them down about an inch so that I could get full coverage with just two wraps of my Duck Band Tape. The tape is thick enough that the brown roll doesn't really show through the white parts of the tape. I was a little worried about that, but it really looks great. 

This is really one of the fastest and easiest projects around. 

Almost Instant Gratification!!



I love that I was not only able to put the cords inside the roll, but the appliance too! With the cord and the appliance inside, it is a little snug but the Duck Tape gives the roll enough reinforcement that it won't come apart.  I LOVE how easy it is to pick up just the item that I want, not a big tangled mess. 
 This is such a great problem solver and would be helpful while traveling with these items too. 

I am currently thinking that all the cords in my house need one of these!!  Everything from lamps, computer/TV components and all my small kitchen appliances.

Not only did I get a roll of super cute Duck Tape but the kids each got one too! I can't wait to see what kind of cool uses we come up with for our new Duck Tape. 

Check out  DuckBrand.com  for some really cool "Ducktivities" and to see all the current colors and prints available. They even have college logos, who knew!

I'd love to see what you've done with your Duck Tape!!