Thifty Thursday + Parties of Birth

I really can't believe it's Thursday again.

This past week went by SO quickly,

and with it came my birthday out of no where!

It still hasn't hit me,

so hopefully this post will knock it into me a little bit. 

First I want to share a little thrifty advice!

The key to being thrifty is to use what you already have,

whether that be extra fabric, old clothes, containers, or stuff! 

Today I will show you three ways that I used things I already had to 

organize & decorate.

#1

I have been feeling awful that I don't have a single Valentine's day decoration up.

Where is the holiday spirit??

Well, being a poor college student, 

I don't have the means to spend lots of money on 

expensive signs, monograms, & wreaths. 

So I decided to tear out some pages from an old magazine and make paper fan hearts.

They turned out super cute, & maybe in the future I'll make a heart bouquet out of them. 

But that wasn't enough. It was too plain. 

I looked around our teeny apartment and found a HUGE stack of old photos,

& so I put them to work. 

I made a collage of pictures, postcards, notes, & quotes

that were important to us.

I then made a simple banner out of cardstock, yarn, & permanent marker. 

So this little Valentine's display was made 100% of things laying around out house, 

which means I spent zero extra dollars on it. 

#2

We have absolutely no storage space in our apartment. 

We have stuff under our chairs, beds, and behind our water heater (not the best). 

So when it came to organizing and storing food,

we ran into a problem!

We had this small, metal shelf that we put in our washer/dryer closet,

which has been working out wonderfully. 

But it was a mess.

After much planning and rearranging,

I used the baskets from the bathroom as storage for our pasta, etc. 

After doing this,

I was able to re-organize the bathroom AND our kitchen,

after spending zero dollars.

It feels so good.

#3

This one is along the same lines. 

I had these two baskets from our wedding, just sitting around,

taking up space and being useless. 

I was THIS close to throwing them out when I had a brilliant idea.

I would use them as storage,

and it just happened to work out that our DVDs fit perfectly into them. 

I spray painted them black,

let them dry for a day,

and then placed all of our messy DVDs into them.

Now I have organized DVDs without spending anything! 

So great.

                         

 And being my birthday today,

I wanted to share a few pictures of what I woke up to this morning:

 The mister loves me!

He was being so sneaky about it. 

He stayed up real late working on it last night (I was very asleep),

and finished around 2 am.

He also wouldn't let me blow my nose early this morning,

afraid that I would see his decorations. 

He also surprised me with those beautiful volleyball shoes, Mark Kay mascara (my fave),

a camelbak water bottle, & a super cute backpack.

He also spoils me. 

But hey,

your 21st birthday only comes ONCE in your life time!