DIY "book" Shelves

I've spent the past month catching up on blog posts that I never got around to writing when I was pregnant.  The past two weeks, I posted all of our nursery projects that we completed in our home last fall.  This week, I want to post a few projects that I completed in our guest room last summer.   They just never made it to the blog once pregnancy and babies took over my life.

In the past, I have posted a few projects for our guestroom.  The following received quite a bit of blog and pinterest traffic:  Painting Horizontal Stripes, DIY Beaded Lamp Shades, Toilet Paper Tubes turned into Art and More Toilet Paper Tubed Art.  Like I had mentioned in those posts, when decorating the guestroom I wanted to keep the cost to a minimum, because I didn't know how long it would before the guestroom was turned into a second kid’s room.  Between the borrowed bed from my sister-in-law, the bedding that we used in our room when we were first married, and numerous inexpensive and creative projects, I have been able to have a guestroom that is inviting and well, I’ll just say it…CHEAP.

Today, I want to share a project that I think I originally saw on HGTV.   I just took my own spin on it to make it work for me.  DIY “BOOK” Shelves is today’s blog project.  Yes, these are literally book shelves, as in books are what the shelves are made of. This project cost me $15 to complete.

To start, I went to the Dollar Tree and picked three hard-cover books.  You can use books that you already have, but I was using these books for decoration not leisurely reading.

Next, I took three pieces of scrapbook paper that coordinated with the colors of the room, cut them down to size and made book covers.

Then, I measured and screwed six shelving brackets from Ikea ($1.99 each) into the wall.

Lastly, I placed the books on the brackets and had myself a great place to display three candle holders that someone had given me as a birthday gift.  And that's it!  That's how to make shelves from books!

Going Yellow - Scrapbook Paper Covered Lamp Shade

 

 

 

I’ll be sharing the last project in my “Going Yellow” series today.  When I decided to go yellow in the living room, I knew I wanted to replace or update the lamps.

 

 

I fell in love with this yellow lamp base from Target for $20.   It was a bit pricy for me.  Since I saved money on some of the other projects, I had room in the budget for this lamp.

 

 

I was having a hard time finding a lamp shade that I liked, and I didn’t want to spend a lot of money.  I ended up purchasing this $8 white lamp shade from Target.

 

 

I wasn’t fond of the plain white shade and wanted to dress it up a little.  To do this, I took two pieces of scrapbook paper, traced them around the shade, cut the paper out to fit the shade, and hot glued the paper to the edge of the shade.  To clean up the edges I embellished them with some trim I had on hand.

 

 

I really like how this lamp shade turned out!

 

 

I hope you all do too!

 

 

 

Be sure to visit the blog tomorrow.  I’ll  be finishing this series by giving an overview of this week’s projects! 

Going Yellow - Mod Podge Table Redo

 

If you’ve been reading the blog this week, you’re aware of my “Going Yellow” series.  This week I’ve been sharing how I updated my living room  by using yellow accents for less than $100.

 

 

Today I’m sharing an easy redo where this table…..

 

 

 

…was updated to this table.

 

 

The original post , “Decoupaged $5 Goodwill Table”, was about how using paper and Mod Podge on furniture can be a creative an inexpensive way to update thrift store furniture.  For this update, all I did was cover the old paper with new yellow paper using the same method that I shared in the original post.

 

 

I love the black, yellow and grey combination of this space now. 

 

I have one last yellow project to share with you tomorrow, so stay tuned.