A few carpet squares

While waiting for the experts to tell us how to save our house, we decided to take some temporary measures to make it more livable.

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My friend, Pam, was over exercising and asked if we had thought about buying some cheap carpet squares.  “Um, you mean like these?”  I motioned to a dark corner where we had a large stack of them.  We bought them to finish our basement with, but set that project aside for bigger things.  I had never thought about using them upstairs until Pam said something.

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So the children carried them upstairs for me and laid them down in a basket weave pattern.  The floor is now clean and soft underfoot.  Yes, it’s too dark and shows every speck of dirt.  And the squares shift around since they aren’t glued down. We didn’t cut anything, just overlapped squares when they didn’t fit quite right.  But with no money out of pocket it’s starting to feel a little more like home.

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We had stacks of flooring all over the house and Heidi helped me move them to one central location then cover with a cloth to use as an island.  (I have since traded out the green cloth for a flannel backed vinyl cloth with fall leaves on it.  I wanted a moisture barrier to protect the hardwood flooring in the boxes.) We moved some of our cooking things down here too.  The ceiling was so low in the attic and there wasn’t enough space to sit as a family that I finally said, enough.  There isn’t much storage down here, so I’ve only brought down the bare minimum in cooking items. And will continue to store stuff up there.  BUT we are so much closer to where the food is kept that life is much better.  During this whole process the thing I miss most is a table where we can all eat together.
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I also hung 4 clipboards on the wall so I could display some of the brilliant art work the children do at school.  There are 4 more clipboards for the other side that I will hang eventually.  The hardest part about hanging them is getting everything lined up just so.  I bought these at amazon, because I really wanted this style of clip, but they have the smaller clip styles at Dollar Tree which work really well too.  I was thinking about trying to stain these clipboards a darker color, but they seem to have a slick finish on them.  I’m not sure stain would penetrate very well.DSC_1707

I love these two pieces of art.  Dub was embarrassed about the upper piece because it was supposed to say, “Hello, Fall.”  But I love it just the way it is and told him so.  We now have a real leaf in the upper clipboard and a second painting by Dub in the lower right. Brandon made the tissue paper piece in his kindergarten art class.  “Why do you think it looks like fall?”  He wanted to know.  It just does.

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I bought the felt leaf shapes from Dollar Tree and stitched them to squares cut from canvas drop cloths to make these pillows.  The idea came from Tatertots and Jello.

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The children went to the pumpkin patch with Aunt Erica and each brought home a pumpkin, so we have scattered them about too.  I love real pumpkins. I’d love to change out the flowers in the vase for each season.  Maybe pinterest has some inspiration for me for things I can gather from the yard?

 

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4 thoughts on “A few carpet squares

  1. Shellee Snyder says:

    Hi Angela!!
    I am one of your blog readers from Pa, and I look forward to my email alerts. I LOVE the fall crafts you did with the kids. My 2 1/2 yr old would love the playdoh idea!! Looks like I may need to take a trip to the dollar store too. I love fall decorations, but I don’t have many up this year for some reason!! Keep up the good work on your home, and keep the posts coming!! God Bless
    Shellee

  2. Missy says:

    I, too, have a kitchen that is a long way from ever being finished. If you know it is going to be a long time, just move back in the kitchen. We have appliances but not a single cabinet. We do have those metal/wood shelves from HomeDepot that we put together as cabinets and a sink that is functioning. It works, not perfect, but we just plug along. Sadly, the kitchen is a long way down the priority list. 🙂

    • Angela says:

      Missy, I think that is my biggest fear. That if I give up and make do, that done will never happen. It’s so easy to get used to the finish trim not up and no outlet covers etc And then we never finish for years and years until it is time to sell the house. Then we fix it for the next family to use…..sigh. It has been our personal pattern for the last 3 houses.

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