More Bargains From The Bins!

I said I have an imminent post... TA DA!
For those that will read this, if you were one of the guests at the wedding who very generously gave us Homebase and other home store vouchers, THANK YOU!!! We were reeeeally busy this weekend making use of some of them, spurred onwards by the equally generous and beautiful photo frames and other gifts that deserve to be shown, not hidden away.

To make our money go further, we took another trip to Aston Clinton's home recycling centre... which caused this face:

I'm not ashamed to say it... I peed myself with excitement when Tom suggested we go and look for stuff there to furnish the house with. The last time we went, I found my now very well used vanity stool which I upcycled the cushion of for £3. We had nothing specific in mind to buy, but just thought we'd try our luck.
And we were lucky!!

We took a lot of rubbish out our garage to actually throw into the dump, but Tom needed something to put his tools away in to completely tidy it up. This 3-draw filing cabinet, which has nice deep draws, cost us £5.
I bought eight small photo frames, altogether costing me £1, which I have spray painted black and will then arrange on the wall in a sort of mismatch collage of pictures. But here's my absolute pride and joy of the day...

This mirror, which is 2ft by 3ft in size and really nice and heavy, cost me £4!! I took the glass and back panel off as soon as we got home and again spray painted the frame. It's really simple - sand it down roughly, wipe with a wet cloth and dry with a tea towel, then two coats of spray paint and leave to dry.

Here I buggered up a little bit... Stood back to admire my handy work, and accidentally stepped on the mirror itself, cracking the glass in two. G-U-T-T-E-D. I sadly ended up paying out an additional £30 for a replacement mirror, so it wasn't such a bargain after all maybe... Lesson learned!! What a rookie mistake! However, once put altogether, it was absolutely worth it!

We've hung it on one of the feature walls, which is purple, and it stands out beautifully! We also bought this lamp, which was a last minute purchase at the till. It is PAC tested and working, and once it was wiped down it looked as good as new. Think it might be from Next or somewhere like that. Anyway, it sets off the whole room in the evenings when the curtains are drawn.

So £15 in all (£45 if you include my stupid mistake) for lots of things that I know would have cost us even more of our vouchers had we gone to the shops themselves. Already planning on convincing Tom to take me back there next weekend...!!

What's been your recent bargain??? Tell me all about it and where you found it!!

BB xx

Button BRIDE!!

Hello hello!! I've been away, so sorry! But to be fair, I was away getting MARRIED!!

On Friday 11th April I married my best friend, surrounded by all our closest friends and family, in my hometown on a perfect sunny spring day! We literally had the most incredible day and night of our lives! I could go on and on about it, but I would definitely begin to bore you to tears!!
The nicest compliments were those that recognised the amount of work that had gone into the day, particularly all the handmade, personalised touches. The pick and mix sweet jars all got eaten! Our 'message quilt' was a novel way of gathering messages of good luck, but everyone had a go. I have enough quilt squares to make a pretty large quilt, which I will start to assemble later in the year.

It all just went so well... So well that I deliberately avoided coming to write here until now, nearly 3 weeks later. The problem with planning your wedding is that you spend so long planning it, stressing over EVERY SINGLE DETAIL and executing ideas, that you actually forget what else you did with your life before it happened!! I was so depressed afterwards, Tom must have wondered what on earth he'd gotten himself into!! But now it's been a while, I can look back on the day and be so thankful for how wonderful it was, in every way. I can look at the presents, the cards, momentos from the day without crying anymore! We have loads of pictures too which are being printed off to adorn our house with.

I have another post in the immediate pipeline but I wanted to share this little one with you first... I'm a very happy girl, to say the least :)

BB xxxx

Buttons And Bows

I don't usually do promos for people, but in this instance I am so more than willing to make an exception. A couple of months ago a friend at uni and I were talking about what I still had left to do for the wedding, and mentioned bridesmaid's accessories. He told me his girlfriend might be able to help me out.

Today I received a bag via him, from her, with all the complete items inside, and I'm SO CHUFFED!

Jemma (buttonsandbows81@hotmail.co.uk) has a day job but makes jewellery and other pretty things for fun on the side. Apart from executing the items beautifully, she was in touch regularly checking what I'd like and suggesting ideas for beads, feathers, fixtures and so on. 

She also included a little gift just for me too... how adorable is this!? Felt is one of my favourite fabrics to work with, so she got this spot on!! If you would like to discuss with her any things you would like made, get in touch via email and let her know!

I'm nearly sorted now for next Friday. A WEEK TODAY. Oh my goodness... Just a few last bits to organise and buy and then hopefully by Wednesday all I'll have to worry about is my toenails and relaxing!

BB xx