Be My Guest | Stephanie from Furniture Flippin'

While I'm relaxing on the warm (fingers crossed) and sunny beach in Gulf Shores Alabama. I've wrangled up some of my favorite ladies to keep you entertained. Maybe you already know them and follow, and maybe you will find a new blog to add to your reader. Today's guest Is Stephanie from Furniture Flippin'! 

Oh the pressure!  The pressure is getting to me.  I have a fondness for my former fellow Illinois Valley dweller Trina and when she put out a call for Guest Bloggers I volunteered.  Now, here it is one week before her deadline and I don't know what to write!  

Do I confess to you the real reason behind my blog Furniture Flippin'?  Do I tell you why my firstborn blog The Hardscrabble Home has been sitting idle for almost a year?  Do I admit that I am hooked on Sons Of Anarchy, The Walking Dead and more recently, Bates Motel?  AND, that my son now calls me Norma?  Or do I share with you news of my on the way very first grandchild and the panic that is ensuing because I don't know how to knit or crochet and I think that's a requirement for becoming a grandmother? 

Sigh.  I suppose I should start with The Hardscrabble Home.  I wanted a creative outlet.  I have always loved to write and thought that a blog would be the ideal thing to tackle since the book on my life (Yes, MY life - even ordinary people can have interesting lives) has sat untouched for 12 years.  I began The Hardscrabble Home and then realized "THIS IS A LOT OF WORK!".  I can't come up with recipes and tips and projects on a regular basis.  I mean, how many aprons out of blue jeans can one person produce?  

I'm not Martha Stewart.  I don't possess the street cred she does.  I'm not a homemaking expert and I've certainly never served time in the Big House like she did no matter what this picture of me suggests.  (Relax.  I used to work there.) 

 
However, along the way with that blog I got serious about repurposing furniture.  Two of my favorite flips are the Dumpster Dresser and the Triple Rocker. 

That's when it hit me!  I can do my flips at my leisure and just write about other people's work.  Let them carry the burden.  I'd make a great boss, wouldn't I?  Except I give credit where credit is due.  Hehehe...

So, that's what I did.  In starting Furniture Flippin' I've met some talented and awesome people.  Trina being one of them.  

On to Sons Of Anarchy.  I binge watched Seasons 1 - 6 this winter with my husband during Snowmageddon.  I got so into it I referred to myself as my husband's old lady and whenever anything happened I would say, "This better not blow back on me!"  Also, every time a Harley roared by the house I looked out the window hoping to catch a glimpse of Jax.  

As for The Walking Dead - if you are a fan of the show, here is what you need to know.  I have an RV, I have a plan in place and on the weekends my husband, son & I try and scare each other in an effort to thwart any tendency to scream.  It's imperative that you are quiet and do not startle easily during a Zombie apocalypse.  I have to say I have become quite skilled at exiting the bathroom without making a sound and I never jump when someone leaps out at me from behind the door.  Stick with me.  Even if you don't possess the skill set that we do, we can always use Trippers to buy us time in case a herd of Walkers come along.  Think of it as taking one for the team.

Bates Motel is a series we just recently started watching.  We rarely watch TV no matter what this blog post suggests but when you are stuck inside by a horrible Illinois winter your options are limited.  You can only eat so many pickles and make so many pickle jar lamps.  I held off on watching this show because I was afraid it would be creepy.  Instead it's more campy and the mother Norma cracks me up.  

Finally, knitting and crocheting.  Do any of you knit or crochet?  Can I Youtube that and learn?  I doubt it.  I'll just wait until the weather warms up and get busy on flipping the furniture for my first grandchild's nursery.  We find out this month whether it's a boy or girl.  I can't wait.  A boy's name has been picked out but they are still looking for a girl's name.  The middle name will be Jo after my daughter and me.  If you have any suggestions, let me know.

So, there you have it.  I fretted over nothing.  I accomplished my first guest blog post.  I'd love it if you visited me on Furniture Flippin'.  Tell you what.  You can start by checking out the feature I did on Trina and her amazing bathroom vanity.  Once you are done, if you have a flip of your own, feel free to email it to me.  I'd love to see it.

~ Stephanie

Omg, you never know what she is going to say! She's too funny, and her blog is full of fabulous flips and hilarious commentary. Everybody get over to her blog now, and if you have a flip (which I know most of you do!) send it to her so she can feature it!  Xoxo Trina


HEY ALSO... Have you entered our Giveaway yet from Teak Closeouts? I know you want to win this bench. So hop to it! Enter here.

Be My Guest | Hollie @ Fancykins

Since I probably have a drink in my hand and my toes in the sand. (Yes, even if it's before noon--because it's vacation!) A few friends are taking over LJBaH this week! Today I'd like to introduce you to my dear friend Hollie who is not new to blogging, but she does have a brand new blog!

Hey, everybody! I’m Hollie, and right now I’m probably (hopefully?) sitting on a beach with our friend Trina, maybe (definitely) drinking some sort of fruity, beachy drink.

When Trina asked me to write a guest post for LJBaH, I was more excited than I probably should have been considering I was at work and swamped with a billion other projects that should have taken precedence. You see, I’ve been friends with Trina for 11 years and her house is one of my favorite places to spend a weekend - I’ve moonwalked along her catwalk and claimed a guest bedroom as my own - and I love to gab about house and blog stuff with her.

Trina and me, the year we were roommates in college, in what remains one of the greatest nights of my life.

So here’s my contribution to LJBaH, which details a night I ate pizza and used a hammer. Small beans for some, a giant leap in small-space living for people like me. Follow my blog, Fancykins (which I rarely update but have big aspirations to do that someday) find me on Instagram @holliecats and on Twitter @holliewrites for more trials and tribulations of lazy decorating and hanging things.

How to hang pictures without having a mental breakdown in 12 easy steps

Step 1: Have two or more pictures that you want to hang evenly, in a row on a wall. Decide you have time to binge on one or two episodes of Bridezillas before you have to get down to the dirty work.

Step 2: Snap out of your reality TV blackout when you realize your apartment is superdark. Notice your Netflix sesh was five hours long, decide to hang pictures anyway.

Step 3: Order pizza from Papa John’s, despite the fact that you live seconds away from a billion other pizza places that are probably way better. Go downstairs and pick up Papa John’s 30 minutes later, cursing the fact that you live so close and that’s why it’s so hard to stick to a diet.

Step 4: Get back up to apartment, super winded because you live on the top floor of a walk-up, decide to eat pizza while hanging pictures to save time. Great plan until you spill that garlic dipping sauce on the rug and the cat licks it up and wants more.

Step 5: Realize there isn’t one single hook on the back of the frame; instead, there are two on either side. No worries, you’ll just use some of that wire you think you got in a photo-hanging kit a few years ago.

Step 6: Can’t find that photo-hanging kit, resort to purple vintage ribbon you randomly find in a kitchen drawer.

Step 7: Vintage ribbon stretches, which means pictures are so uneven it looks someone hung them up after taking a billion shots of Fireball. Eat more pizza, call for backup.

Step 8: Backup arrives, also eats pizza. Together, you decide to hang two nails on either side of the frame where the two hooks are. High-five each other and get to work.

Step 9: “Maybe we should see if there are tips online?” the backup asks after three failed attempts. Realize the iPad is all the way in the other room, suggest trying again after you eat more pizza and add a few songs to your “Housework Jamz” playlist on Spotify.

Step 10: After 1,000 extra holes are hammered into the walls and the pizza is gone, the pictures appear to be somewhat even. Use your Handy Level app and get confirmation that they are indeed as level as you’re ever going to get them.

Step 11: Step back and survey your handiwork, gasp in horror when photos look super freaking uneven. Realize your vintage apartment has crooked ceilings and floors, which make everything look wonky and all of your stress was for nothing.

Step 12: Make personal pacts to hang only gallery walls from now on, fix these pictures another day, start diet tomorrow. Pin yourself to sleep and dream of future projects.

Step 13: Never fix the pictures, eat pizza again two days later. Realize you’re not the only one who eyeballs this stuff. Feel OK about your apartment, your pictures, your life.

And that’s it. Easy-peasy, huh?

Any LJBaH readers have simple picture-hanging tips and tricks you’d like to share, or are you giving it all up to hang haphazard-yet-cohesive gallery walls? Do you even have to measure those things?

Hollie

Well, I didn't realize she was going to share a college days, drinking-in-a-bar, kissy face photo of me, but there are worse ones she could have included....Thank god there were no Iphones when we were in college!


P.S. Only a few days left to enter the giveaway for this beauty. Enter Here.