I have a love hate relationship with Pinterest

I LOVE Pinterest, I really do. I love going on there and feeling inspired to create things. There is something wonderful and special about creating things with your own hands.  The thing I don't like is that Pinterest is like Mormon Mommy Blogs, people put their best stuff out there, but the overload of things on there can make a person feel guilty if she is not baking gourmet meals, recycling and redesigning the families wardrobe and making all her own organic cleaning supplies.  I have found many great ideas on pinterest that I have used for activity days. The hard thing for me is adjusting my expectations based on the skill level of my girls and our itty-bitty budget.

My project this past week started when I went to this celebrating Home party and saw all the beautiful Home Decor including this painting that I just loved.  Like I usually do, I thought, "hey I could make that." So I went to the store and started checking out the supplies. Luckily I stopped myself before spending $60 to recreate a painting that with their sale was only going to cost $50. So I splurged and I bought it.

When it came in, my co-workers began to tease me asking if I even had a single thing in my house that would match my new painting. I thought, "Well, no, but it would look nice in my bedroom. Maybe I can find a good bedspread that would match." I got online and I found one but it cost $90. Plus $90 more for pillows and shams.  I decided to wait for my birthday and then see if I could ask for it, but I didn't want to spend that much on a bedspread.

Then, I started looking on pinterest and feeling crafty. What pushed me over the edge was that darn Joanne's mailer coupons. That is our only craft store in town and so I started invisioning making my own bedspread. It was college days so I drug my husband and his college ID along with 3 screaming kids to the mall and tried to pick out fabric and quilting supplies before all patience was gone (that lasted about 30 seconds). Nothing was on sale so I wasn't able to save that much because I forgot my 50% off coupon. Then we were down at a Walmart with fabric and I figured Walmart has cheap fabric so I bought a bunch in differnt colors because I didn't have my original paisley to match to, several of them didn't end up working for the quilt. I then found my coupon and went back to Joannes and bought the backing and  returned the full price batting for some 1/2 price.

I have a baby quilt someone made me that I just love so I decided to copy it and enlarge the scale.

 So I stayed up late a couple nights with Adam doing his homework and began cutting and sewing. I am not the best seamstress and definately not the most detail oriented person. This is my finished project, however, and I do like how it turned out. I'm not sure it was frugal, however because in the end, I spent over $100 on supplies and several hours of work. But it is handmade. It is very big 110 X 110" and I was able to make my own shams and throws :)

Stay tuned to my next project where I puchase $30 worth of materials to make $24 birthday party swords that I could have purchased at the dollar store for $1/ each....