Winners and Holiday Home!

Well hello there! Hope you had a lovely weekend!!

I need to announce a few lucky winners!

The winner of the Black and Decker Steam Mop is Natalie at The Bibler Family!

The two winners of The Rusted Chain giveaway are Lori at Itsy Bitsy Stitches and Veronika at Love Tuvster!

Congrats ladies! Please send me an email at thriftydecorchick (at) gmail (dot) com and I’ll get you connected with your goodies!

I also wanted to announce that my gal pals and I are baaaack with the Holiday Home Link Parties!:

I think I speak for all of us when I say this holiday series has become our favorite!!

I can’t wait to see what you all come up with!

Layla will kick it off with table decor ideas, Rhoda is up next with mantels, then Kate with holiday crafts and we’ll wrap it up with my annual Christmas tree partay!

Can’t WAIT!

For now, I’ll be back later this evening with the November Before and After Party!:

See you then!

Giveaway Weekend!

Wow. You all love a free steam mop, eh? ;) I love it!

After you’re done cleaning the floors, you’ll deserve to treat yourself. And I have a GREAT way to do that this weekend!

One of the great blessings of my life has been blogging, for more reasons that I can count. But one of the biggest reasons is the true friends I’ve met over the past three (plus) years.

Some I’ve really met, some I’ve never met but feel like I have. And feel like I’ve known them for my whole life. One of those people is my friend Beki of The Rusted Chain:

Beki writes a beautiful blog, takes beautiful pictures and makes beautiful hand-stamped jewelry.

I just love her pieces and always love sharing them with you. Here are a few of my favorites!

I love that so many of her necklaces can be personalized and made into a one-of-a-kind piece. This one with the little pennants is too cute!:

Isn’t that adorable?

I love the little dainty hearts on this one – one for each kiddo:

I love those little bitty pearls as well. :)

This one is PERFECT for the photography nut:

And the sweet little clouds and umbrella on this one just make me SMILE:

The thankful necklace is just beautiful – the colors are perfect for the fall (or any time of year) and the message works all year long as well:

I LOVE that one!

I also love that she’s created a way to personalize any of the pieces – these little bitty charms can be added to any necklace for just $7 each:

I love how sweet and dainty just the small tags are on a necklace by themselves too! You could add them to anything – a charm bracelet, any necklace, a keychain. Love!

Beki doesn’t just make necklaces though – her bracelets and earrings are lovely:

And her prices are FANTASTIC! Especially considering the handmade and personalized part. ;)

I especially love their new holiday ornament for this year:

It is beautiful and unique and rustic – it would be especially lovely for a newly married couple or to mark something special that happened this year. I don’t know if we should get “We’re debt FREEEE!” on ours or “Welcome Peanut.” (Our crazy dog.)  ;)

OK, onto the REALLY good part! First of all, anyone that orders from The Rusted Chain till November 12th will get 15 percent off by entering discount code “TD15.”

Of course any of these pieces would make GREAT Christmas gifts (cough…49 days…cough), or it would be a lovely way to treat yourself. Just sayin’. ;)

The kind folks at The Rusted Chain are giving TWO of you $50 to spend as you wish! With that, you could buy something for you, something for Mom. Or something for your sister and something for your BFF. Or something for you and something for you. (It’s allowed.)

Here’s the three ways to win one of two $50 Rusted Chain gift cards:

1. Leave a comment here. What are you up to this lovely fall weekend?

2. Visit The Rusted Chain here. Take a look around and come back to let us know what piece you’d love to have!

3. “Like” TRC on Facebook, come back here to let us know in a third comment.

**I wanted to make sure you all know, the Facebook option is NOT mandatory – all the options are just extra ways to win. :) You can enter one time, two, or three!

Remember if you comment anonymously or you have a private blog, please include your email address in each entry, and spell it out with “at” and “dot” to avoid any spammy emails coming your way.

This giveaway is only open to US residents only. It will be open till next Monday, November 7th at noon EST.

Hope you have a warm and cozy weekend!

A steamy giveaway!

Hello! I have some FUN for you today – this post is all about cleaning the floors!! WHOOOOO! I mean, really. Is there anything more exciting?

Just CALM DOWN. I know it’s awesome. (The real awesome comes later, hang in there.)

I’ve mentioned before that our previous floors were laminate. The fridge died, leaked water all over, and the laminate was toast. Fast forward a couple months later and a (very) helpful insurance check, and we ended up with hardwood floors.

Have I mentioned how much I love them? If I could hug floors, I would these. (I may have tried. It was not pretty.)

Our laminate floors were super shiny and IMPOSSIBLE to keep clean. I cannot express to you the agony of the cleaning (using a floor cleaner and one of those microfiber mops – which was not easy to push around) for a good hour, then not two minutes later someone would walk through in bare feet and I would be in a corner rocking and mumbling something about “floors…clean…help.”

It was intense. :)

After our new floors were installed I asked the Floor Guy how to clean them, and he recommended a steam mop. That made me giddy, cause the fine folks at Black and Decker had sent already me one to check out:

I actually got it before the floor debacle and tried it on the laminate and it cleaned them well, but did leave streaks. But ever.y.thing. I used left streaks – I found out later it was because of the build up of all of the cleaners I’ve used on them over the years. Nothing would clean them up.

I’m THRILLED to say the steam mop did stellar work on the new floors. I’m in heaven. No more mumbling.

I told you before that the new floors don’t show anything. We go in and out of this back door multiple times a day and bring in dirt, water and dust. I hadn’t cleaned our floors in over a week week, and this section is the worst it got:

Can’t see it? I know. Because they rock my world.

Here’s a closer look:

I know. Still not bad. Hate me.

One of the many things I love about this steam mop is that it’s ready to go in seconds – you just grab one of the (THREE!) pads they provide:

Just lay it face down on the floor and place the mop on top:

The steam mop has three different settings:

I of course picked the wood option, which I’ve noticed seems to “steam” the least of them – which is a good thing when dealing with wood.

I put water and just a bit of vinegar in the mop and then push it around a bit. It dries almost immediately – I mean supa fast:

OK, that may be the most underwhelming before and after of all time, cause the before looked pretty good.

 

I know. Rocks my world.

This is the area we walk through the most every day, and you can see there are NO STREAKS!:

Holy cats. Hallelujah.

Oh. happy. day.

Best part? It takes less than ten minutes to clean all of the floors in the family room and kitchen. That took at least an hour (and some sweat) before.

We get sun all day in the back of our house, and before it was like a big huge pointy finger, highlighting all of the smudges and dirt and footprints.

Now, it’s just…(pretty) floors:

I also use the steam mop on our vinyl, tile and the peel and stick floors in the laundry room – every type of flooring cleans up great!

The AWESOME folks at Black and Decker are offering one of these beauties to one of you as well!:

That would be a $120 value. Told ya – WHOOHOO!!

Here’s how to enter to win a Black and Decker steam mop:

1. Leave a comment here. Tell us the hardest spot to keep clean in your house.

2. “Like” the Black and Decker Facebook page here. Come back and let us know you did.

Remember if you comment anonymously or you have a private blog, please include your email address in each entry, and spell it out with “at” and “dot” to avoid any spammy emails coming your way.

This giveaway is only open to US residents only. It will be open till next Monday, November 7th at noon EST. (So you have plenty of time to enter!)

Happy cleaning! :)

Month(s) In Review!

Hello hello! I’m back with another month in review – but this one is two, YES, two times the fun because I’m reviewing all of the projects and posts from September and October. I kinda forgot about September. ;)

Because I’ve got so many to mention, I’m going to keep the talking to a minimum. I know. Don’t be sad.

I started off September by showing off the lovely Tracie from Cleverly Inspired:

Then I showed you the new light over the kitchen table:

I shared some SCRUMPTIOUS crock pot recipes:

Next up was the easiest but most time consuming fall wreath evah:

I shared some personal pics of the Ground Zero Museum here:

And showed you my DIY pallet table and what I ended up with instead:

I asked for your advice on our new floors here:

(Some great thoughts in the comments if you are looking into hardwood floors!)

After the water fiasco in the kitchen, we got our beadboard island back:

I spruced up the front landscaping by simplifying (and adding a little mulch):

Our long backyard projects were finally complete, and I showed you the deck here:

Next, I got my craft on with some candy corn goodies:

Because the old fridge was shot, we had to get a new one. And I’m in luuuuurve:

I forgot to mention in the post that it’s a Kenmore Elite – 31 cubic feet of space baby! And yes, I still love it. :)

The patio (and fireplace!!) reveal were up next:

I made another fall wreath, and this one went much faster:

October was kicked off with ghosts in the trees at the Before and After Party:

I showed you our new peel and stick tile in the laundry room:

I haven’t forgotten about the tutorial – it’s coming soon!

And then we partied like rock stars at the Fall Outdoor Spaces link up:

I finally finished up a job I was dreading – painting the beadboard in the office. I made it go super fast by using my paint sprayer:

Even though took a week, I knew having our floors finished on site was the right decision when I saw them installed:

I showed you how I transformed the front door from brown to red in this post:

While I was waiting on the stain to dry, I shared my top ten basic tools with you:

And then the floors were done! And I was in love:

That room already looks different. (Just a smidge.) Show you soon! :)

I took advantage of the furniture being out of the family room and moved the roman shades and drapes up to let in more light:

Last week I brought them back…the Halloween mice! This time with a little bling:

I shared our fun and easy pumpkin carving party:

And then ended October by sharing my last minute Halloween display:

And now I need a nap. :)

That’s the past two months in a nice long little post! Wow, I had a lot of energy. ;)

Here’s to a FABULOUS November!