Tiny Peek: This (New) Old House

(We linked up to The Nesting Place's Paint Colors Linky!! Check it out here- they have a ton of amazing color inspiration!)

In The Mood For Love..

 

(Check out the Valentine's Day Challenge!!!! Lot's of awesome project ideas- just click the button!)

Howdy! Can you believe that today is February??? Now, we're not huge fans of going Valentine's Day loco, but we decided that our place needed a little decoration to fill the post-Christmas void. Specifically, our shantle. What is a shantle, you ask? It's the top of our all-purpose hold-it-all shelf in the living room that we decorate as if it were a fireplace mantle! You may recognize it from this little DIY gem:

Mike's Bookshelf Re-Do was so fun and awesome! It left us with a nice open shelf (heretofore referred to as our shantle) to decorate!

So here's what we did to spruce it up for Valentine's day!

We swung by our local Dollar Tree (endless resources for cheap DIY-ers like us!! For under $20 smackers, this is what we came up with: (oh and check back for the terrarium how-to!)



And on top of our long bookshelf, a sweet little framed photo from our engagement portrait session and another "snow" candle.



We plan to add a few more decorative elements- maybe some fancy teacups that are just hanging out in our cabinet filled with candy? Or some smaller tea light holders?

What about you??? Do you decorate for Valentine's Day?

Visions of Daffodils Dancing in my Head

Oh man. I'm officially over winter. D-o-n-e. I know that I live in New England, and that winter lasts until April here. I know that's it's only mid-January. That doesn't mean I can't start doing a little spring day-dreaming. I decided to brighten up my (and hopefully your) day by putting together a little spring decor inspiration- inspired by this cute spring wardrobe wishlist over at Bower Power!

C'mon spring!

The Living Room

Our main living space is currently rocking a mis-match of greens, yellows and browns. Not even nearly as fun as it sounds. Here's what I would do to brighten it up for spring:



1) Add some bright accents that won't break the budget.

Canary tea light holders from CB2 for only $7.95/each!

2) DIY some new felt flower pillows, inspired by the ones we found at Z-Gallerie which are out of our budget at $49.95.

3) Bring in some nature to give our living room- nests, plants and bird accents are all floating our decorating boat right now!

-Moss balls found at Crate and Barrel- $12.95 for a set of 9.

-We will find some unfinished wooden birdhouses at the craft store and paint 'em ourselves! The ones on our board are from West Elm and are priced between $24 and $34 bucks.

The Kitchen

Our poor, poor multi-tasking kitchen. Oh kitchen. You have so much potential, if only someone would pay attention to you. Your dark wood cabinets and linoleum floors are crying out for a makeover. Since we don't own this place, we're not willing to put money into renovations but that doesn't mean we can't pretty it up a little! I'm dreaming of a bright, girly upgrade...

 



1) Cute, cheap and sunny- a bowl full of citrus is the cure to a blah day. I'd put them in this gorgeous, mid-century inspired bowl from Crate and Barrel for a mere $14.95.

2) Don't you love these mod place mats from Krista at CraftsbyKJ on Etsy? At $24 for a set of 4 they are such an easy way to de-frost your dinner parties! Oh, and as a bonus- they're reversible!!!

3) A huge bouquet of daffodils is a sure sign that spring is around the corner. This gorgeous arrangement can be found at a local florist here in Boston, Central Square Florist, but you can certainly find them at your grocery store or farmer's market.



Oh, and how much do you LOVE these happy little laundry hampers? At $20 bucks, it's an affordable way to take the drudgery out of my most hated chore. Crunch Can by Umbra at the Container Store.

Bedroom:



1) We already talked a little about wanting a headboard. I think upholstering it in a gorgeous, saturated color would be awesome.

2) I plan on making a bunch of these bad boys from some t-shirts that I'll pick up at Goodwill. I'm thinking that some pinks and greens would help us get our spring on. Check out the AWESOME tutorial from Floral Showers!!

3) I'd add some romantic candles to brighten up our otherwise dark bedroom- these guys from CB2 are only $1.95-$3.95/each!

4) We were gifted with a gift card to Blik, so we're thinking of adding one of these cute (and springy) decals over our otherwise boring bed. This "Insomnia" decal is $35 and completely removable/re-stickable!

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So that's how we're planning on beating the winter blues. How about you?? Leave us a comment and let us know how you're thawing out!

Tiny Holidays: Typographical Wrapping

So I was browsing around ManMade when I spotted a great and cheap way to wrap and personalize holiday gifts. Using simple mailing paper and a page from any old book, you end up with an extremely simple but amazing wrapping for any present. Here is the tinywalletstyle method of making Typographical Gift Wrap

Tiny Holidays: Quick Gift Wrap Upgrade

Howdy! We're taking a break from the trenches of gift wrapping to bring you this cute idea we came up with to jazz up an otherwise boring gift. For the holidays, we like to give tickets- movie, concert, sporting event, etc. The problem with giving tickets is that they just kind of...sit there in the envelope. We are festive kind of people, so of course we had to find a quick (and cheap!) way to jazz up our presentation.

The Goods- Festive Fall Decor

So Mike didn't really want his birthday celebration to scream "birthday" and nixed the usual streamers and balloons. Instead, we went with a festive fall upgrade to our dinner table which usually looks like this:



(To be fair- this was  right after we got home from grocery shopping! It doesn't usually look this terrifyingly disorganized.)

With a few cheapy cheapy additions, it ended up looking like this:

A Tiny History

A little history lesson about us here at Tiny Wallet Style!

We are renters who are so close to owning their own home (but thanks to the cautionary tale that was the 2008-present economy, we are entering the housing market armed with research and a sound budget). Renting means that we have very little power to change our digs- sticking us with dropped ceilings, lots of linoleum and....sponge painting! (Did I just hear someone faint?)