ARC is looking very spring-y these days. There are lots of great Easter items out and lots of fun sandals, too. This inspired me to try my hand with some actual live plants…again…hopefully keeping them alive this time. I wanted to use items from ARC, both planters and non-conventional items, to make some distinctive home décor.

I’ve collected a lot of small containers over the last few months from ARC. I found these great mini Pyrex “fridgies” last month for $1.99 each.

I saw this teacup last week and bought it along with a matching sugar bowl. I love the spring flower design.

This vintage mug I’ve had for a while; I bought it at ARC just because I loved the design.

I found these great succulent plants and decided to use them inside all of these different containers with the hope of bringing some of this spring-iness inside.

I started with some of the tiny ones, placing rocks in the bottom because succulents need space to drain when they are watered.

From there I just tucked the plant in on top and filled in some of the sides with more soil and rocks. So easy!

Some of the larger plants I put in actual planters from ARC.

This snail planter I’ve had for a while. I bought it at ARC a few months ago for $3.99 and have been using it to store different items.

The little guy below might be my favorite. It looks so cute in the vintage sugar bowl and looks very at home on my shelves. The trick with succulents, apparently, is to water them very rarely. Hopefully I can keep them alive!

I just kept planting…as long as I had creative containers from ARC I figured I’d use them!

The nice thing about making so many is that depending on the design of the containers/mugs/bowls, they look good in different parts of my house with different décor. They also make wonderful gifts. I’ll definitely be hunting for more beautiful tea cups at ARC and using them for gifts.

Overall, this was a fun and easy project. It was a great way to bring some spring into my home and a creative use of all the excellent containers I’ve thrifted at ARC.

Everybody’s got that wall space in their house that they just can’t figure out what to do with, right? I definitely do. It’s in a tiny bathroom and doesn’t always get much light so I struggle with what would work in there. I decided I needed something bright that would catch your eye even without a ton of light and I wanted something interesting and different than the other items in my home. I think I achieved all of that with this project.

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I started with a frame from ARC. There is truly no reason to ever buy a picture frame from anywhere else. ARC always has a huge selection in every size imaginable. This one was a beauty; it was deep, which I needed for the succulents, and it was a thick frame so that the actual space I’d need to fill inside it was small. It was also half off J.

I started by removing the paper backing, popping off the wooden back and pulling out the glass.

All I was left with was the great frame and space in the middle.

From there, I cut a piece of thick foam core that would fit into the open space. I hot glued it like crazy, all over the back edges so that it was strongly in place. (The hot glue gun came from ARC a long time ago-it’s been a vital part of many a project.)

I colored the foam core black so that it wouldn’t stand out as much between the faux plants (though I’d recommend painting it instead, due to the marker fumes).  Then came the fun part: I took fake succulents and started arranging them on the foam core. When I found an arrangement I liked I pushed the stem through to the back and glued or taped it into place.

I played around with a lot of different arrangements and finally found what I liked. I’d found a bag of assorted moss (apparently a real thing that people sell) that had been donated to ARC and bought it to fill in the gaps between the bigger plants.

I love how full the final product looks and how the different textures complement each other. The frame itself adds a lot of texture and interest, as well.

This will definitely look great in that hard to fill wall space. It’s far better than anything I’d buy and when it’s homemade I love it even more.

Happy New Year! January is the time to go through all of last year’s stuff and get organized for 2016. This is no easy feat for most of us. I wanted to share the many ways that I use ARC items to organize my home. These receptacles are mainly vintage, because that’s what I love, but there are tons of modern options at ARC, too.

I use a vintage pitcher from ARC to organize my kitchen utensils:

In the living room I use a vintage planter to hold coasters and bookends from ARC to organize my dvds (most of which were also bought at ARC J).

I use an ARC mug for makeup brushes in the bathroom, a mason jar for Q-tips, and a vintage tea tin for cotton balls.

This vintage candy dish is a great catch-all for chapsticks and bobby pins:

I also use lots of ARC jars and receptacles to organize art supplies and desk items:

All of these things were found at ARC and keep my home looking far more organized than I feel. Good luck with your own 2016 organization projects!

I wanted to squeeze in one last project for myself this holiday season so I went with an easy one. I see tons of great jars all the time at ARC and decided to use some to create winter scenes. I found some interesting ones at my local ARC that I thought would work well.

My next step was to round up some winter miniatures. I had a tiny ceramic deer from ARC and a toy car that I painted to cover up the racing stripes. On the miniature car I glued a small tree and then wrapped a piece of twine around it.

This went into one of my smaller jars with a little bit of fake snow and that was it—done!

The deer was slightly more complicated, but only slightly, because I wanted to use a taller jar that I found at ARC with a large cork on top. I was able to glue a taller tree to the bottom just using my hands, but to get the deer and another smaller tree glued in, I had to use tweezers.

Once everything was glued in it got a dusting of fake snow and then it was complete.

Both of these jars turned out great with my supplies from ARC and were so unbelievably simple. I hope your holiday crafting turns out just as well!

This is one of the easiest and cutest crafts that I’ve made all year. It’s a great end product for not much of a time commitment. That’s the best kind of craft, if you ask me.

I had a bunch of vintage ornament boxes leftover after making an ornament wreath and some of them had great, retro designs. I decided to create some vintage Christmas shadow boxes for further decoration.

First I removed the clear plastic from the top of the boxes and then I gutted them to get rid of the individual ornament slots:

Then I covered the back of the boxes with shiny wrapping paper in order to make it brighter when I put the items in and help make them more visible.

Finally, I added the fun stuff! One box got just a simple deer that I was lucky enough to find in a bag at ARC.

The other one got more details: a faux flower glued up high, a vintage elf from ARC (another treasure from one of their bags), and some garland.

I glued the top or front of the boxes back on and added a few finishing touches. Then it was done! I took a picture showing the sides of the box and the way things are tucked in there.

These were so, so easy and turned out great. I love the way they look tucked around my house.

The holiday season equals crafting season in my book. There are so many fun Christmas and winter crafts to make. I decided that this year, the first one on my list was a vintage ornament wreath. I’ve seen some beautiful ones online and once ARC put all of their Christmas items out, I started hunting for ornament treasures. I knew I needed tons of ornaments for a large wreath so I bought a lot of boxes of vintage glass globe ornaments in all different colors.

I found a good amount of them bagged, too. I love the ARC bags because there’s always some good stuff, you just have to hunt to find it.

It’s not hoarding if it’s for a project…right? I was lucky enough to find some great Shiny Brite ornaments and several different designs. I knew I wanted some fancy ones to go on the front of the wreath. I went through all of the ornaments at ARC that I could find and came across some really beautiful ones.

I was even lucky enough to find the wreath form at ARC. I love the crafting section in each store. I always check there first before a project because I’d much rather put my money towards a wonderful cause versus a big craft chain store.

My first step was to wrap a tinsel garland around the entire wreath form. I didn’t want any white styrofoam peeking through. Using hot glue I secured one end and then wrapped the whole thing and glued the other end to make sure it wouldn’t unravel.

After that I started gluing the larger, plain globe ornaments all around the outside edge. (Good thing I was able to find so many at ARC-this wreath took a lot of them.) This project is all about the glue gun; everything is secured with hot glue.

Once the outside border was done, it was time to start gluing onto the front of the wreath. I tried to mix and match colors and designs to get a good mix of them. This was the fun part!

Here is the wreath in stages, as I added more and more ornaments:

And finally, the finished project:

I love this wreath! I think it turned out amazing. It might be my favorite thing that I’ve ever crafted all thanks to the great ornaments that I found at ARC. And it’s only the beginning of the crafting season!

One of my favorite things at a party is when there’s a photo booth. People seem to love wearing silly things and taking pictures of themselves, no matter what the occasion. At my recent Halloween party, we decided to make our own photo booth corner. It was Harry Potter themed so I hit ARC for supplies.

We’ve got Harry himself:

ARC actually had a brand new-in-package Harry Potter set, including the glasses and wand.

Then we’ve got Dumbledore:

This one I put together myself with a jester hat that I cut the bottom off, reading glasses and a new-in-package beard from ARC. Grand total was under $5.

Next is Mad-Eye Moody:

I found the eye patch at ARC for 68 cents and glued on half of a plastic eyeball. (The flask belongs to a friend…) This one was my favorite because it was so simple to transform something thrifted into something new.

Last is Luna:

This was another super easy transformation; I added two pieces of vellum to these great glittery star glasses.

Other items included witches hats, brooms, graduation robes, and a sword(of Gryffindor!), as well as a homemade Wizard’s Most Wanted poster.

Finally, what Harry Potter party would be complete without a Sorting Hat?!

(Originally a “Buccaneer” hat from ARC.)

This was such a fun project to shop for and work on and people seemed to love it!

If you haven’t been to ARC lately, you are missing out. Halloween time is the most fun in the ARC thrift stores. There are costumes galore, wigs, accessories; everything you could possibly need for an amazing Halloween. Recently I went in not for costume purposes but for props. Some friends and I are throwing a Halloween party, which means we need decorations. One of the things we wanted to create was a set of potions bottles and jars to have around the house for a spooky atmosphere. I set out to ARC to find what we needed in the way of containers.

I found all kinds of great bottles and jars perfect for potions. I bought large and small to have a variety, visually, and to have different options when deciding what to put inside. My favorite is a beautiful, vintage decanter that came with a label already on it.

After purchasing and cleaning all of the jars and bottles, my friends and I set about making our “potions”. We used all kinds of things inside the jars and then designed some labels to go on the front. I think they turned out amazing!

Some of you may notice the Harry Potter theme. We’re slightly obsessed…..

I hope this project inspires you to hit your local ARC thrift store and come up with a spooky Halloween project of your own!

I moved into a new home last summer and am just now figuring out what to put on the walls (no judgment, please). ARC has been a major resource in this venture. Not only have I found pictures and frames, but I’ve also found craft items that I’ve used to make wall art. My most recent project was this Home Sweet Home cross stitch:

I found the special cross stitch fabric in a big roll at ARC for $1.99 and then I found the frame for $2.50. I started by stretching the fabric behind the frame and stapling it with a small staple gun to the edges of the frame.

After it was nice and tight I counted the squares the length and width of the frame and made a plan for my embroidery using a piece of graph paper. There’s probably an easier way to do this but I went old school. After I had the design mapped out I started stitching! I used mint green embroidery floss that I had left from a previous project.

When I was all done I put a wire through two of the staples so that I could hang it.

Voila! This was a super easy project on a very cheap budget. I love the way it turned out and I really like how it looks next to my vintage picture of Maroon Bells (also an ARC find, of course J).

Please enjoy this wonderful poem, written by our wonderfully talented arc Ambassador, Lorraine Espinoza, entitled, “Happy Things.”

Happy Things

Beautiful dreams, I dream of unicorns in my head, just before I go to bed. These unicorns are bright, just want to say, “little one, have a good night” “little one, I want to keep you warm.” I want to make sure your blanket is not worn, and I am so glad you are born. You are an unexpected blessing, I never knew I was getting.

I wouldn’t change a thing for all the joy you bring. It is all the little things you do, that make me love you. Your beautiful face, your wonderful ideas, of the way the world should be. Climbing trees is your favorite thing to do. Fixing your scraped up knees, with a Band-Aid and a little kiss.

Always being there to protect you, that is what I wish. I wish I could do, and nobody would hurt you. Dream deep my little one, and go to sleep, and you will learn your life is very unique. You are special, in your own way; that is what everybody has got to say.

This is something I hope for you, this is something I hope you can do. Be wise and help open people’s eyes, to all the challenges in your life. Help them understand what your life is, and what your life could be. We are all the same, you and me.