I found this cute vintage case at the thrift store for $1.50.

It is the perfect place to keep cards and letters and it looks great sitting out on my bookcase.

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Turn an Old Bike into a Balance Bike

Last year I turned my daughter's old bike into a boy approved bike for my son.

Transforming a Girl Bike into a Boy Bike

It has been an entire year and my son has ridden this bike only once. He hates bikes and refuses to learn how to ride even with training wheels. This year I learned about balance bikes and decided to try once again with this bike. My husband ripped off the training wheels, pedals, and chain, so now my son has a balance bike. A balance bike is great for teaching kids how to balance on a bike without complicating the experience with peddling. The bike has to be small enough for the child's feet to touch the ground and they simply walk with the bike and learn balance. I watched a couple of YouTube videos and was convinced that this would help my son.

Spray Painting a Ceiling Fan and Clock

This week I focused on the last few details in my kitchen. A while ago I painted one wall in my kitchen yellow, thinking it would brighten up the room. I already had one green wall and red bead board, so the yellow wall just added too much color in an already colorful kitchen. Back in June I ordered a free quart of paint from Glidden. I didn't know what I would use the paint for at the time so I just chose whispering wheat. This week I pulled out this little paint can and used it in my kitchen and LOVED it! Now I want to paint every room in my house whispering wheat.

I also finally painted my gold ceiling fan after 8 years of living in this house. It was the only original light fixture left and I had avoided painting it because I thought it would be a pain. It was actually really easy and I wish I would have done it sooner. I just used a can of dark brown flat spray paint. I didn't sand or prime first since it will be on the ceiling and no one will touch it. While I had the spray paint, I painted my gold clock and a couple of picture frames to match.
Total cost was $5 for the spray paint!

BEFORE

AFTER

BEFORE

AFTER

BEFORE

AFTER

I just removed the blades from the fan and sprayed away. Those blades really needed to be removed and dusted and washed off anyway (They must have had 10+ years of filth on them).

Upcycling a Sweater • 3rd Penny Pinching Party

I'm also linking up to Reinvented's Trash to Treasure party today. Kimm is a great example of upcycling!

Upcycling is "The practice of taking something that is disposable and transforming it into something of greater use and value" From the book Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things by William McDonough and Michael Braungart.

As I was cleaning out my garage and getting ready to take a load of unwanted clothes to the thrift store, I had an idea. I started looking at the pile of clothes and seeing them in different forms and uses. I decided it wouldn't hurt to cut some clothes up and try upcycling since I was getting rid of them anyway.

I bought this sweater for my husband years ago, early into our marriage before I knew that he doesn't wear sweaters. It had a lot of use left in it since it was never worn.

1st I found a hat and traced the shape on the bottom part of the sweater. I sewed it up and finished it off with a zig-zag stitch. I put a flower clip that I had made on it so it can be switched out with different clips (Sorry about the yellow blobs in the pictures. I am very protective of my kids).

Then I cut the sleeves off and just sewed a zig-zag stitch to finish off the edges. I sewed the bottom of the sweater under and then did a zig-zag stitch.

I took the sleeves and cut the sides off so they were more straight. Then I sewed under the bottom edges and finished them off with a zig-zag stitch.

And that is how you upcycle!

Total cost for this project: $0

Total time: about 20 minutes

Now for my weekly

Penny Pinching Party!

Here are the rules:

Add the permalink to the specific blog post, not your general blog address.

Link back to the party from your post so that your readers can join in the fun! If you have my Penny Pinching Party button on your blog I may even feature your link when I highlight my favorite Penny Pinching ideas next week.