Don't throw that out!

I'm stuck at home with a gross cold, surrounded by blankets, a hundred used Kleenex' and a sleeping dog. So why not use this time to write another post about penny pinching.

So as I have recently mentioned, we are renovating our basement. We removed our staircase  which used to be an L shaped one, and replaced it with a new straight staircase. The wood form the old staircase was very solid and I really wanted to do something with it so we made night stands from it. They are currently rather tall compared to our bed, but the plan is to eventually make a bed frame that will heighten our bed to a more proportional height in comparison with our night stands.

I also made baskets for the night stands to hold small or personal items. I simply made a box out of cardboard, and them brought my handy glue gun ( a crafter's necessity) and lined the inside and out side with a printed fabric. In my case I used the same fabric that I used for the trim of the lamps that are on my nightstands...gotta coordinate!) I then added a ribbon trim to clean up the edges and a bow so that I have something the pull the box out of the shelf with...like a drawer handle.
I still plan on adding one more thing to the night stand, but I am not too sure if I will do this or not. The plan is to create a sort of hammock under the shelf, that will really act as a second shelf. This would solely be to add a little balance the shelf as I feel the bottom half is too empty. Unless one of my readers has another suggestion which I would be open to hearing/reading.

What else is new?
Olive, my dog, got into our Halloween chocolate. I know you are probably gasping at the thought of a dog eating chocolate, but no worries...she survived it. My house on the other hand was covered in doggy doo-doo and smeared chocolate...some of it I wasn't sure which was which. She also decided to eat this chocolate on the quilt that I am making and so there is chocolate stains on that as well.  One week later at my husbands birthday party ( a.k.a Fritzmas), she helped her self to an entire bag of dried jerky a.k.a biltong which my husband received as a gift. So Ollie had a fairly fulfilling week.

I feel like a lot of the things that come out of my mouth starts with the phrase " I saw this thing on Pinterest..."
so....

I saw this thing on Pinterest. A new way to use your fire place. Our house has a non-functional fire place. I.e. we would need a new pipe inside our chimney, and an insert, whether pellet, wood or gas we haven't decided what we would want in the future. But for now,as seen on Pinterest,  it's filled with candles. Tall candles, short candles, skinny and fat. For now we have been lighting the actual candles, but eventually we will fill the hollowed ( by means of burning) candles with electric tea light...just to give the effect of the candles burning. The look is very cozy, without the cost of gas or pellets or wood, and once the electric tea lights come into play, without the risk of fire.

To sum it all up: I'm sick, my dog is a pig, I like Pinterest for DIY ideas.