{Fairy Lights & Shiny Things}

If you happen to follow me on Pinterest, read my Five Favourites For Friday, or know me personally, you would know I have a love of fairy lights and shiny things! 

I have so many fairy lights sitting in the cupboard for Christmas time (and a few around the house that I turn on every now and then) so when I came across this brilliant tutorial for DIY Marquee Lights by Sugar&Cloth featured on Grey Likes Nesting, I knew I just had to give it a try.

Last week, there was a bit of excitement around here as Cairns finally got their own Masters hardware store.  I love this store!  Well, at Masters they have a range of wallpaper, including designs from the Laura Ashley range.  You might say - yeah, but what has that got to do with marquee lights?  Well, I'm glad you asked!  Masters let you take a 20cm SAMPLE of their wallpaper range.  How cool is that? (I won't tell you how many different samples I've already taken!)  So I used one of these samples to use in my marquee lights.

I also bought one of those cardboard letters from the discount store and used some battery operated lights that were sitting in the cupboard.  All up I spent a total of $3.00, which was for the cardboard letter.  So not only was my marquee letter easy to make, it was also so cheap.  Gotta love that right?

(supplies:  cardboard letter, fairy lights, pencil, eraser, ruler, stanley knife, coin.  And glue, not pictured)

First I cut the backside of the letter off, and then covered the remaining with the wallpaper sample.  I used just normal glue to stick the two together.  After waiting for the glue to dry, I then followed the instructions to cut holes for the fairy lights from the tutorial here.  Shove the bulbs through the holes and WooHoo:

My own little Marquee letter, made by me!  Finally a DIY I've done that isn't a total disaster!!

 

Linking up with the Say G'day Saturday linky party held by the wonderful Natasha of NatashaInOz.

{Broken Nails and Teabags: OR Is Pinterest the new Google?}

I hate my fingernails (even though I have a Pinterest board dedicated to nail art - you know, just in case!)  Toe nails I don't mind and I paint them all the time.  But my fingernails, especially the two thumb ones, keep splitting at the sides.  Normally I just cut them off and suffer with short nails for a few weeks, but this time the thumb nail on my right hand split a bit too far down to just cut off.

Enter Pinterest.  Pre-Pinterest I used to google just about everything.  Now I search Pinterest for anything AND everything (Sorry Google, I still love you). 

So what did I learn?  Tea Bags.  Yep - tea bags apparently fix broken nails!

Cut a small square (big enough to cover your break/split) out of the tea bag.  Using a base coat nail polish, paint your nail .  Whilst still wet, place tea bag square over your split.  I then did another layer of base coat.  When dry, top with whatever polish tickles your fancy!

NOTE:  I had to repair both thumb nails - on the good one I used a blue glittery polish and you can't see the bag at all.  But the one on the left hand (on the right in the picture above)  I used dark polish and the tea bag sticks out way too much.  Plus I smudged it....quite a bit.  So don't use dark polish - unless you can paint your nails properly, which I can't!!!

Now I'll just have to wait and see if the tea bag bit hardens when dried and stops things getting caught it in (yesterday I was trying on a top in a shop and may have accidentally pulled a thread, or two, with my split nail!) 

......And I have to repaint my other nail.

Where do you search for answers on the Internet?  Is Pinterest the new Google for you?