The View From Here Today

The sun was so sunny today! Does that make sense? So bright the greens were so green and the blues were so blue. Beautiful. I'm seriously LOVING the flag hanging from our porch now. It was definitely worth the $1 investment . I take it out in the morning, take it down in the evening. It's nice to have porch duty again.....we missed you summer.

We Have a Winner!!

The baskets are on their way to their new home!!!

Thanks for the response to my FIRST EVER giveaway..it was fun!

I wish there were baskets to send to everyone!!

And the winner is.............Kimberly at the Cupcake Cuppy!!

(check out her blog...super cute ideas!!!)

Enjoy your new baskets Kim!!

Free Organization!

This is the beginning. The beginning of a little boy room remodel. My boys have informed me they would like their room to look different...more "big boy". I've had this free free cheap cheap project rolling around in my brain ever since, because let's face it....boys need organization!

We started with this. Target diaper boxes (which we are finally almost done with...YAY!!) I used cloth diapers with both my boys...until my youngest decided to get ENORMOUS before he was potty trained...and I couldn't justify buying the whole next size in cloth for just a few months. We have also been organizing closets and getting rid of t-shirts that are GINORMOUS (do you remember the '90's?) They came in VERY handy for this project!!!

First I taped the box flaps down inside the box.


Cut the t-shirt into pieces to cover the box.



Sew it all together, stretch it over the box, add a felt star and VOILA! Super cute, FREEEEEEEE organization! I have three more boxes to cover and add to their "big boy" room! These boxes are really sturdy and could be covered in ANY fabric to match any decor! Go crazy! :-)

I also snatched up a FREEEE set of lockers on Craigslist....
I'm seeing a theme developing here. ;-)
I'll show updates as they happen!

Oh! And don't forget to enter my basket giveaway HERE!!!!

Linking up to:
Metamorphosis Monday at Between Naps on the Porch

Made it Monday at Persimmon Perch

Just Something I Whipped up at The Girl Creative

Making the World Cuter Monday

A Friday GIVEAWAY!!!

THIS GIVEAWAY HAS NOW ENDED. THANKS FOR STOPPING BY!!

Pretty pretty baskets, where will your new home be??

Are these not the cutest baskets you've ever seen? I'm so excited to be hosting my first giveaway EVER!! This giveaway is in collaboration with CSN Stores, where you can get EVERYTHING for your home....from corner tv stands to gorgeous bakeware!

To enter for a chance to win these SUPER CUTE baskets, here's the rules!

1) Post a comment telling me how you would use your new baskets! (along with an email address or some form of contact in the event that you are chosen) on this post.

2) For a second entry become a follower of Notes From the Heartland...

in the right sidebar over there==>

or tell me you already are!

(Just leave another comment letting me know!)

The contest is open to readers with US or Canadian addresses only and ends on

Tuesday, April 27th at 5pm.

A winner will be chosen randomly.

Thanks and good luck!

The Little Birdies Have Landed

Welcome home little birdies! Do you remember a few days ago I mentioned I was super lucky enough to win these little guys from Michael's giveaway over at Inspired by Charm?

Today was the big day of their arrival!! And let me tell you, they arrived IN.STYLE. I totally should have taken a photo of the box and packaging...it was so pretty! If I hadn't torn into it like a wild dog at the meat market I could have shown you. Beautiful handwritten label, note, GORGEOUS baker's twine wrapping the birds into their pink tissue blankets.

I think the birdies like their new home.

And as if I wasn't feeling like the luckiest girl on earth already.....Michael was kind enough to include this box of Goblin Chocolates as a little extra.

Combine two little boys, a surprise box of THE.MOST.DELICIOUS.CHOCOLATE.EVER, and a mommy trying to take photos of said chocolate.....not a pretty scene people. They were VERY happy when the chocolates' photo shoot was over and they could dive in. Thanks Michael!!



The boys were so sweet with our new porch friends.....our oldest told our youngest to "be very careful with the birdies. Mommy loves them and she would be sad if they broke." He's so kind.




Aren't they just the cutest thing ever?

Welcome Summer!!

Monogram Window Tutorial

Please ignore the GIANT reflection in this photo...it was just that time of day.

I've had some REALLY nice comments about the monogrammed window on my springtime mantel. SO....I thought I'd share a quick little tutorial! This is a really quick, really easy project for big impact. I like that....easy and big. ;-)

First find a design you really love...it can be ANYTHING. I use Microsoft Publisher to do everything, so I copied the image I found into Publisher, sized it to my window, inversed the image (this is important), then printed it out. Here's a little tip....you don't need to print it out in black, just do it in light gray. SAVES INK!!! Did you know printer ink is the single most expensive fluid on earth? My husband told me that, so I'll just take it as fact.

When you have your pages lined up, tape them all together and trim the whole show to fit inside your window frame.

Find a really dirty, really old FREE window.




The dirtier the better.
Be sure to clean clean clean your dirty dirty window.
Windex the heck out of this puppy.



This is the only part that might be confusing. When your window is nice and clean tape the image onto the side of window that you want to see as your final result. My window was stained wood on the good side, painted wood on the other. I wanted the stained side to show, so I taped my image to that side, so that I could see the inversed image through the window.

When your image is placed the way you want it, paint away! I used Folk Art acrylic craft paint in a nice turquoise color. Don't get too caught up in making everything perfect. Focus on nice brush strokes and clean lines.

It's best to paint on the back side of the window because the finished result is a nice smooth image through the glass. You can paint on the front of the glass if you prefer, but I like the smooth look behind the glass.




Paint over your image a few times to get a nice opaque coverage.
Remove the paper from the window. Flip over your window.

There you have it, a pretty (easy) monogrammed window!


Linking to:
Metamorphosis Monday at Between Naps on the Porch

Thrifty Treasures at Southern Hospitality

It's So Very Creative at It's So Very Cheri

Trash to Treasure Tuesday at Reinvented

Wiggle Tree Mystery SOLVED!

Once upon a time (last summer), a tall wiggly twig grew and grew....straight up from our backdoor flower bed. Usually these poor little saplings get trimmed right off....but this one was different. It made us laugh because it would quiver in the wind. If you were 100 times taller than you were around you would quiver in the wind too. ;-) Thus, the puny little tree was named the wiggle tree....and we watched and watched as it got taller and taller all summer. Then came winter. We forgot about the wiggle tree.

This spring the wiggle tree was back in all its glory, sprouting leaves to and fro. In fact, so many leaves, I took a photo to blog about....and ask for help identifying our wiggle tree.

But then....a miracle.....our scrawny, pathetic little wiggle tree......became a butterfly.

Otherwise known as a beautiful, flowering, blooming crab apple tree.

I would now like to invite whatever bird whom pooped this beautiful tree into my flower bed to return often. Poop away dear bird, poop away.