family Archives - Insanity Is Not An Option

Budget-Friendly DIY Gallery Wall

Spruce up your living space with a Budget-Friendly DIY Gallery Wall. We took our living room from ho-hum to hey-hon with some cheap canvas prints and budget plaques in no time at all. So can you! You should know, I did receive product from Canvas on the Cheap in exchange for this post, but all opinions are my own!

We bought our house 2.5 years ago. I haven’t decorated much. You see, since the minute we moved in, we’ve had different house guests “living” with us for different lengths of time. It seemed pointless to decorate. I mean, there was crap in every corner, always, and it was all I could do to stay up on the vacuuming, toilet scrubbing, cooking, kitchen cleaning, laundry, etc. But about a month ago, the last of our guests moved out and my house is mine again. I’ve (we’ve) resolved to not have any long-term house guests “visit” anymore, so it was time to make this place my own!

Are your walls in need of a makeover on the cheap?

Prior to now, my walls were PIT-I-FUL! Although I think my family is beautiful, I realize that a spattering of three family photos on a large wall (quite serious photos at that) didn’t do much to say who we are. This wall was boring, we looked staged (we were), and it just doesn’t show our fun side. This is the wall people see when I meet for work. This wall had to be reworked. Bah-bye, boring wall! I had so many (FUN!) family photos, I knew exactly what to do. I turned to Canvas on the Cheap for a budget-friendly DIY Gallery Wall. We needed to show our fun side, and show our fun side we did!

I placed my order and I was shocked at the prices! I just knew this was going to be crap when the package arrived. I chose two photos from a family shoot gone wrong (thank goodness it did) for my gallery wall. When the packages arrived, I was pleasantly surprised to see the personalization involved. Thank you, Kaylee, for caring enough about my family memories to package these memories with care!

Packaged nice and tidy and clear as a bell, my canvases arrived in about a week and I was ready to make my wall magic happen!

The babies each chose their favorites and they were excited to see our gallery wall come to life as well!

I am very impressed with the quality of the prints. The edges look almost hand folded although I doubt they are – unless Kaylee did that too! They are very similar in quality to the smaller prints you see on my wall that I had purchased from a different online vendor a year or so ago.

The one true difference is affordability! The 8×8 prints I got from the other vendor cost about $22 each (tax and shipping included, so the order for four 8×8 prints was $85). The price of the 16×20 prints from Canvas on the Cheap is $17.60 right now with their summer special, so they were a total of $35 each (with tax and shipping for full disclosure for those of you on a budget). I did order the two 16×20 prints separately so the shipping cost is a little higher – be smarter than me and think ahead and place your entire order at once to keep shipping down.

Once you add in some totally cheap signs from Ross or Marshall’s, you’ve got yourself a gallery wall. Easy, peasy, cheap, and impressive on a budget.

Need canvas prints of your family photos?

If you are in need of a budget-friendly wall makeover, turn to Canvas on the Cheap for help! They’re constantly running amazing sales and they offer a variety of sizes and different finishing options. I, for one, couldn’t be more thrilled with my gallery wall and I was so proud to show it off in a meeting yesterday. Finally, a little touch of my personality in my living room. Now to go look around the house to see what else I can spruce up!

My Christmas Wish Isn’t That Complicated

By Christy Leave a Comment

World peace? Equality for all? All of the riches of the world? Well, yes, all of these things, but my Christmas wish is much simpler than all of this and it is every year. This year, I really hope my Christmas wish comes true.

My Christmas wish is simple. It’s not just peace on earth, good will toward man, and all that jazz; it’s about peace and joy within my own household. See, every year, I paint a perfect picture of our holiday in my head. We wake up, we rejoice in the season, we open presents, we eat amazing food, and we just enjoy each other’s company under the twinkling lights. We have the perfect Christmas. But what is perfect anyway? My mind’s eye tells me there is no bickering, no disappointment, no negativity.

That’s my Christmas wish. Is that too much to ask?

With a large family, I guess it is.

As a child, there was always chaos. My parent’s coffee was never ready before my sisters and I woke up. Someone always ruined a surprise because someone peeked the night before. My sisters and I would bicker because “she got more than me, mom!”. Always something.

As an adult, a parent with a lot of kids and a blended family, I’ve never been able to pour that first cup of coffee or focus my camera on the gifts before someone woke up and counted the presents (surely, they were uneven in number, but not in cash – but I could never point that out, because…SANTA!). Chaos. Bickering. B getting mad over all of the bickering and bickering too much himself or just heading to the beach for a “break” (break, you know, those things moms don’t get?). Do they know it’s Christmas time at all?

So, this year, my Christmas wish is this (and it’s really simple)…let us all just enjoy the day…together. No one gets mad. No one feels slighted. No one fights. No one leaves because they get mad (and possibly drink too much) and don’t want to adult (not me for once). We have a problem with this and I know we can’t be the only family.

All I want for Christmas is a fuss-free day. For once, I want no one to notice that things don’t “look” equal. I want each one of us, within my own home, to notice that we have a good life. That we have a strong family bond. That the magic of the lights and the season, and the love we have for one another, is so much more important than anything under that tree.

I want to feel the magic that I felt when I was 10. I want them to love the fact that we’re together, that we’re healthy, that we’re a family. I want us to all go to sleep saying that this was the best day ever simply because we were all together in the day.

If I get nothing for Christmas under the tree this year, I don’t care. I’m just committed to the fact that I know that I want to be happy knowing that my (non-bickering) family is under the tree together this year.

Is that too much to ask? My Christmas wish is simple. I want my first-world-problems, bickers-too-much, non-appreciative family to just appreciate and love this year. No nonsense, no chaos, no fighting…just love and togetherness.

Merry Christmas, y’all! What’s your Christmas wish? I sure hope it comes true for you this year!

Never Underestimate the Power of a Good Deed

By Christy 2 Comments

Never underestimate the power of a good deed, especially during the holidays. You never know whose life you’ll change forever. My life was forever changed thanks to a good deed back in Christmastime of 1988.

It was Christmas time and I was a 21-year-old expectant mother of my first child. It should have been an exciting time. I should have been full of wonderment and joy. I was full of fear, and I was alone. My then (sorry I ever met him except for the fact that he gave me my first two true loves) husband got locked up for a DUI, again. I had just started a new job. I really didn’t know anyone there and I surely didn’t share my insane personal life with them.

My mom had called, after hearing of the news. I was at work, at my new job. I did my best to be quiet. No, mom, I don’t need anything. I’ll be fine. He’ll be out in a few days. I’m fine. I’m totally fine. Yes, I know it’s Christmas, but I’ve got this! No one heard, it was cool; I was fine. But apparently, someone heard and someone heard me cry in the bathroom after that phone call. Someone knew that I didn’t even have a tree. Someone KNEW that my heart needed to enjoy my favorite time of the year, despite my circumstances. Someone, her name was Julie, changed my life that year, in 1988, and I’ve dedicated my life ever since to paying it forward.

Never Underestimate the Power of a Good Deed

I walked into my office that next morning, sat down at my desk, and there was an envelope just staring at me, with my name on it. I opened it. I read words that warmed me like maybe no other words ever have. I cried.

$50. A cool $50 and a simple note. Doesn’t seem like much, right? Change in your pocket. So wrong.

So, so wrong.

Those words…everyone deserves a Merry Christmas…forever changed my life. And it’s changed the lives of many others since.

You see, that Christmas, that year, I was ready to throw in the towel. I didn’t want to bring a child into a cruel world that didn’t understand how much I loved this season…how much I loved humanity. I thought bad things, alone and pregnant in my little apartment that week. I wasn’t sure if I could go on…or not. I wasn’t sure if that baby girl had a future with a mom like me. That note, that kind and thoughtful note, changed my entire life and the life of my unborn baby girl.

I went out that very night and bought a tree, a fake one that didn’t make me sneeze, and blue ribbon with pink bows because at the time, I didn’t know if she was a boy or a girl. I decorated my tree. I cried, I laughed, I rejoiced in life, and in the season. I was excited for the first time in a long time. Julie, little did she know, changed (possibly saved?) our lives.

With a kind note, $50, and love in her heart, she saved our lives and made me love Christmas again. Thank you, Julie, wherever you are. I still have your note. I still read your note. That note meant so much more than the money you tossed my way, so much more than that blue and pink Christmas tree that year, so much more than you’ll ever know.

NEVER underestimate the power of a good deed. Someone, somewhere, might still be fueling their Christmas spirit, their entire life in fact, off of that one good deed nearly 30 years later.

I often think of Julie. I often hope that her life turned out as good as mine. I’m pretty sure it did. Today, I’m glad that I don’t have to worry about how I’ll afford a tree; how I’ll provide for my children. I’m in a better place. I thank the Julies in my life for putting me here and I’m determined to constantly pay it forward because I learned in 1988 that a simple kind deed can change someone’s life.

My life is better now, Julie, thank you. I hope you’re living the good life too; you earned it many years ago, whether you know it or not!

PS – Julie, I never told a soul back then, but I’m telling everyone now because they really need to know. Everyone needs to know. Your “simple” gesture way back then is too powerful to conceal anymore!