You may have noticed the wooden lamp in my stepsons’ room in the photos I shared from their room makeover.

My husband and I found it at Goodwill a LONG time ago and swore we would give it a makeover. Well, that never happened. However, we needed it because none of the bedrooms in our apartment have overhead lighting and it provides the only lighting in the room.

When Walmart challenged me to do a spray paint project with the new Rust-Oleum American Accents Ultra Cover 2X paint, I knew that I would finally tackle this lamp.

First things first: What’s so special about this new paint formula? Well, American Accents Ultra Cover 2X has “Double Cover Technology”, which is designed to cover twice the square footage of other general purpose spray paints. It is also designed to have better coverage in fewer sprays, meaning one can promises to cover and perform like two, making projects faster and easier. Having done my share of spray painting projects, I really wanted to see if this would hold up to those promises.

Our only prep work was to tape off the top of the lamp, along with a few inches of the cord. The wooden surface of the lamp was relatively gritty, so we decided not to use a primer. Next up, spraying.

I have to say, this stuff covers like a dream, and it doesn’t drip a whole lot. My husband did two coats (not quite light coats, but definitely not heavy), and he managed to cover every nook and cranny of the twisting wood design.

Painting the lamp was so easy and quick that my husband actually requested something else to paint. So we grabbed a decorative “J” that once had hung in my daughter’s room. Like my husband, daughter and I, all my stepsons’ names begin with J, so we knew it would be the perfect complement.

The paint has a great glossy finish that really made the lamp and letter pop, and we knew the bright yellow we chose would be an awesome counterpoint to the blue, gray and green color palette already present in the room.

Want to see for yourself?

The Final Verdict

I really love the fact that this paint offers such awesome coverage. With other paints I’ve used, we’ve had to do sometimes 3-5 coats to get really good coverage. Definitely not necessary here, and at $3.77 a can at Walmart, one can will go a long way. On the strength of that alone, I would use it again, because spray paint is one of the quickest and most painless ways to revamp something you already own rather than throwing it away.

That said, I’m always partial to low-VOC spray paints — of which there are few — and from all the information provided to me, this is not one of them. Given the choice, I will always choose low-VOC, but these are admittedly hard to find on store shelves. If I couldn’t find a low-VOC option, I’d definitely use this instead.

Disclosure: As a participant in the Walmart Moms Program, I’ve received product and compensation for my time and efforts in creating this post. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

© 2008-2011 Green Your Decor. Do not republish any items from this feed without permission.

I’m a wife, mother and a businesswoman, and I’m busy. All. The. Time. I will also fully admit that cleaning house is not one of my favorite things to do. All of this means that I love the idea of anything that will make cleaning easier for me.

When I first saw commercials for the O-Duster floor cleaner, I was intrigued. An automatic sweeper I could turn on and forget? And at less than $40? Sounded great! So when Walmart offered me an opportunity to try this machine, it was a no-brainer.

The O-Duster is not a vacuum. It is a floor sweeper that works by using electrostatic cloths to pick up dust, dirt, pet hair, etc. on hard floors. It doesn’t work on carpeted surfaces. We have a couple of rooms with solid floors, including two that act as pass-throughs to the rest of the house: The entry and hallway, and our kitchen.

With all the walking that happens in these two areas, the floors get grimy pretty quickly. Which means that when we don’t sweep at least a couple times a week and mop at least once a week, it becomes a real pain to clean the floor.

Enter the O-Duster. In honesty, it’s not the perfect solution for us. While it does pick up some dust and dirt, in my experience it also pushed a lot of dust and dirt around. We used it on the 30-minute setting, and while the sensors worked relatively well to keep it moving once it hit an obstacle, a lot of the debris that was on the floor when it started was still there when it was done. Which means I still had to sweep. Not exactly what I was hoping for.

I did, however, notice that the floors did feel quite a bit smoother than they do with sweeping alone — almost a buffed feeling.

At the end of the day, I’ll probably continue to try it, since I already have it, and try the longer hour and a half-long session. But as of right now, I have to say it didn’t really work for my family’s needs. It’s easier to just sweep in the first place if we’ll end up having to do it anyway. Plus, when I sweep, there’s nothing to throw away except dirt. So the broom is the winner. For now.

If you’d like to try it out for yourself, you can get it at your local Walmart store for $39.98.

Disclosure: As a participant in the Walmart Moms Program, I’ve received product and compensation for my time and efforts in creating this post. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

© 2008-2011 Green Your Decor. Do not republish any items from this feed without permission.

So…remember the other day I shared a photo of our disaster of a patio? In case you don’t, here are some more photos of it to jog your memory.

Lovely, right?

Well, the good news is that it got that way mostly due to laziness. So it really was nothing a little elbow grease couldn’t fix.

But sometimes, elbow grease alone isn’t enough. The dead plants in all our pots screamed neglect. My husband, our resident green thumb (because I am not at all horticulturally inclined) decided we had to remedy that.

We headed to Walmart to pick up some new flowers and herbs to fill the pots — meaning the ones on the patio and the ones in the kitchen. We figured if we’re going to get a bunch of things that grow, we may as well make some of them not just beautiful, but useful. So we bought peppermint, for our favorite tea, along with thyme and rosemary, which we love to use for cooking.

You may recall that we planted seeds last year with the same intentions. Well, let’s just say it’s a lot easier to take care of plants that are already growing than it is to take care of seeds that have to sprout from scratch. Or so I’m hoping.

We also chose a colorful selection of flowers for my hubby to put in our existing planters.

My daughter helped pot the herbs, which will hang on a plant stand.

Finally, as much as I would love a cushy fancy patio furniture set, we just don’t have the space for it. Because of this lack of square footage, we bought a couple of basic metal chairs last year. Functional, but neither beautiful nor very comfortable. We remedied that this year by grabbing some beautiful new Better Homes & Gardens ikat pattern cushions from Walmart. (aff)

We knew the pattern and colors would look great with the green outdoor rug we already own, and that they’d made our resting places a lot more cushy.

The grand total for our spring patio refresh? $103.96 (the cushions were $31.98 apiece, accounting for the bulk of the budget, but totally worth it because they really make a difference)

Here’s the finished space:

Not bad for a single afternoon of cleaning and planting, right? We’ve already been eating dinners on the patio and otherwise enjoying the space. Just remind me of how much we’re enjoying it next winter when it becomes a dumping ground again.

Disclosure: As a participant in the Walmart Moms Program, I’ve received product and compensation for my time and efforts in creating this post. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

© 2008-2011 Green Your Decor. Do not republish any items from this feed without permission.

This happens every year. As the weather starts to warm up for spring, my husband and I will venture out onto our patio and wonder what the heck happened. You see, we tend to use our outdoor space quite a bit during the warm months. But as soon as the weather turns cool, and then cold, the porch becomes a glorified storage space where our recycling goes to die. Covered in pollen.

Seriously, it looked like a warzone out there. Definitely not a space that encourages hanging out. So on my last trip to Walmart, I couldn’t help but swoon over the outdoor goodies to be found in the garden center.

They had everything from tropical plants that reminded me of home:

To patio furniture setups that really make me wish we had a bigger space to work with:

They also have a great assortment of outdoor rugs that could make any space look properly put together:

I left the store lamenting the size of our tiny patio and the fact that we really don’t have room to do anything extravagant. Still, we can definitely do better than this:

Later this week, I’ll be back to show you what we did do with a little elbow grease and small budget. Trust me. It looks a WHOLE lot better now!

Disclosure: As a participant in the Walmart Moms Program, I’ve received compensation for my time and efforts in creating this post. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

© 2008-2011 Green Your Decor. Do not republish any items from this feed without permission.

Once you make a conscious effort to live a greener lifestyle, you’ll notice a mental shift. Things that once would’ve gone in the trash suddenly get a second look, and you’ll try to figure out how to reuse them, rather than just throw them away — even if they were going into the recycling bin.

That is the idea behind Walmart Green’s latest giveaway, the Recycle Revamp Pinterest contest.

How does it work? Simple! All you have to do is create a new pinboard called “Walmart Green Earth Month: Recycle Revamp”. Then repin Walmart Green’s Recycle Revamp contest pin, which links back to the Walmart Green Room. Next, pin a photo of your upcycled project. It can be anything you want, as long as you have created something new from of old items. For example, you can use glass bottles to make a centerpiece for your table like I did last spring, cover shoeboxes with fancy paper, or use all those loose hairpins or old t-shirts to make some funky jewelry. In your pin’s caption, be sure to include the #WalmartGreen hashtag and explain how you reused something old to make something new.

Finally, to make sure your project isn’t missed, send a link of your board to grnroom@walmart.com .

The top 10 pinboards will come to a group of us Walmart Moms, and we’ll choose the top three projects! The third place winner will receive a $100 Walmart gift card, second place a $250 gift card, and the grand prize winner will receive a $500 Walmart gift card! You can enter the contest through April 30, and the winner will be announced May 6!

You can learn more about the contest in Walmart‘s Green Room and follow me on Pinterest for great DIY and craft ideas.

Disclosure: As a participant in the Walmart Moms Program, I’ve received compensation for my time and efforts in creating this post. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

© 2008-2011 Green Your Decor. Do not republish any items from this feed without permission.

Last week, my husband and I did something we swore we wouldn’t do: We painted another room. Did I mention we’re renters? Yeah. And we’ve already painted the dining room and our daughter’s room, so we’re going to have a lot of un-painting to do when we move out — or a big fee to pay. But what can I say? When Walmart gives you an opportunity to try out Disney low-VOC paint, you take it, and decide what to paint later. (aff)

This time, our third bedroom, also known as “the boys’ room” or the “man cave” got some special treatment. And boy, did it need some special treatment.

My stepsons are only with us for the summers and a few other weeks a year, so the rest of the time, that room had become the junk room. The place where we’d randomly put stuff until we could figure out a permanent spot for them.

That wasn’t working for us. At all. So we cleared it out and got to painting.

We received two colors to try: Half Pipe (blue) and Making Tracks (gray). I promise you, it took us two days just to figure out how to use the colors. We debated doing a loose, organic wave treatment on the wall, taping off an intricate pattern, and about a dozen other ideas before we finally decided to just do something simple and do a single gray stripe through the middle of two blue blocks.

To accomplish this, we first painted the middle of the wall gray. This paint has very little smell, awesome coverage and it dries pretty quickly. In no time, we’d done two light coats of gray.

Next, we taped off the gray on top and bottom, knowing we’d overlap the blue on the jagged edges and the tape and wind up with a clean, seamless line from blue to gray and back.

The trick was to make sure the gray was fully dry before taping it off, because if it had been wet, we could’ve pulled off some of the paint when we pulled the tape. The other trick was pulling the tape while the blue was still a bit tacky. This will give you clean edges, as dry paint on top of the tape can inadvertently pull some paint off the wall if you wait until it’s all fully dry.

The final result:

Finally, we had to pull the rest of the room together.

When we first moved into this apartment, we bought the bunk bed on Craigslist and invested in some great organic bedding from West Elm when it was on steep discount.

But there are 3 boys — not 2. So we also invested in a twin sized air mattress that rests on a frame up off the floor. This makes it the height of a regular bed, but gives us the option of taking the bed down when the boys aren’t here so we can use the room as a guest room, often with a queen sized air bed for adult guests.

I’d also been collecting small details for the room. Some art, a pair of great, eco-friendly animal hooks:

And a map world map my husband loves to use for impromptu geography lessons:

It was a happy accident that the map fit perfectly on top of the gray stripe.

Overall, we loved the paint. It is no-VOC before colorants, and low-VOC with them added. It has almost no smell, though we still opened the window in the room just as a precaution. I was more than comfortable letting my daughter help with the painting. It provided great coverage with a thick first coat and a light second coat just to even it out. We have a lot of paint left, so I’m debating how I can use it to do something fun on a non-permanent surface, like a piece of furniture or a canvas. The paint is available now at Walmart, if you’d like to try it yourself.

We’re really happy with the colors and how they round out the room. They feel like they belong in a tween/teen boys’ room, which is great, because I was worried that the blue might read a little babyish. The boys haven’t seen it yet, but I know they’ll love it once they do!

Disclosure: As a participant in the Walmart Moms Program, I’ve received product and compensation for my time and efforts in creating this post. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

© 2008-2011 Green Your Decor. Do not republish any items from this feed without permission.

I am a renter, and occasionally, I truly begin to lament this fact. Of all the rooms in my home to which I wish I could take a sledgehammer, the bathroom is second only to the kitchen. Not that our bathroom is terrible or anything. It’s just that while it is functional, there’s nothing outstanding about it. Ideally, my bathroom would feel like a spa at a high-end hotel, or at least be a calming, modern space where I could truly unwind and let my hair down.

I’ve been browsing the Modern Bathroom website and swooning over all the possibilities for a contemporary, eco friendly vanity. Here are some of my favorite options:

Natalie Double Bathroom Vanity

Talk about a dream bathroom! This 72″ double bath vanity would more than fulfill all my husband’s and my storage needs and give us each a sink so we wouldn’t have to fight for elbow room when we’re brushing our teeth in the morning. On top of that, it’s made of environmentally friendly oak hardwood, engineered to prevent warping, along with a water-resistant low V.O.C. finish. $1799

Abba Vanity Set

While the realist in me says this probably wouldn’t provide nearly enough storage space, the idealist in me sees two of these babies mounted next to each other on the wall for a sleek, modern look that would make me swoon every time I walked into the room. $999/ea.

Accara Double Bathroom Vanity

I’m love the look of the sinks resting on the dark marble countertop. I envision it paired with slate tile and river rock accents on the shower wall. See. My mind’s eye is getting excited again. $2649

Every morning when I brush my teeth in front of my basic, builder-grade mirror and rest my toothpaste on the laminate countertop, I’ll close my eyes and wish I had one of these instead. A girl can dream, right?

(sponsored post)

© 2008-2011 Green Your Decor. Do not republish any items from this feed without permission.

It’s been a long while since I’ve done a giveaway, so you know it would have to be a special company that brings me out of my lull. And Dsenyo is nothing if not special.

This company, founded by Marissa Perry Saints, was started with a singular purpose: To provide economic and social opportunity for women in Malawi, Africa. After living and working there, artist Marissa Perry Saints founded Dsenyo to give struggling women and artisans a chance to earn a living. They handcraft gorgeous handbags, aprons and other accessories that feature beautiful African textiles, and every item is Fair Trade — meaning that the artisans are not just paid, but paid fairly.

The company also donates a portion of their sales to community development projects in Malawi and partners with nonprofit organizations to help them raise money. In addition, Dsenyo products are made with low-impact dyes and sustainable fibers like jute, hemp and organic cotton whenever possible, and they reuse textile remnants and compost organic scrap material. Even better, their “Old for New” recycling program allows customers to send back their used Dsenyo bags so that the materials can be reused, recycled and composted. Plus, the customer gets 10% off their next purchase.

If the back story wasn’t enough, you can see from the photos above that these products are beautiful! Dsenyo has been featured in the Green Gift Guide for several years, with good reason. I’ve always been a fan of African print fabrics, and these are the perfect way to inject a little bit of it into any wardrobe. What’s not to love?

Why It’s Green:

• Items are handmade AND Fair Trade
• Items are made with sustainable materials like hemp and organic cotton whenever possible

Price: Gifts from $8-135

Bonus Coupon!

Grab Dsenyo’s beautiful, handmade gifts for the special people on your list and get 10% off with coupon code “GREENDEC10“!

Want to Win?

Are you sold on Dsenyo? I definitely am, and I can think of a few ladies on my Christmas list who would love to receive a gift handcrafted with care. You, however, have a chance to win a beautiful denim button bag in your choice of print!

Just use the Rafflecopter widget below to enter. Javascript must be enabled to to see the Rafflecopter. If you still cannot see it, wait for the page to load completely, or refresh the page. U.S. and Canada mailing addresses only! Entry period ends at 12:00 a.m. 12/15/11.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

© 2008-2011 Green Your Decor. Do not republish any items from this feed without permission.

You know those beautiful floral arrangements you see in model homes and high-end stores? Well, the closest I’d ever come to making one of them was trimming the stems on some monochromatic mums and placing them in a vase on my table. Pretty? Yes. Impressive? I think not. So when Walmart gave me a chance to learn, hands-on, how to make a professional quality floral arrangement, I jumped at the chance. The best part? It’s really easy to modify your arrangement to fit any theme, color scheme or occasion.

Case in point: I made the colorful, summery arrangement shown above during a recent trip to Walmart headquarters in Bentonville, AR. The color of the flowers and the cuties in the bottom of the vase make it perfect for warm months, but I knew that for the holidays, I’d want an arrangement to complement the rest of my holiday decor in shades of purple, gold and white. Here’s how I did it:

You’ll Need:

• Transparent glass vase
• Plastic bowl (needs to fit the top of your vase)
• Floral foam
• Something to fill the bottom of the vase
• 1-2 dozen flowers
• Greenery (to fill in spaces)
• Sharp scissors or garden shears

You can get everything you need at Walmart, or you can use things you already have around the house.

Start by filling the bottom of your glass vase with whatever you chose. I opted for the same shatterproof Christmas ornaments I used in my wreath project because I wanted a nice splash of purple. Before you get to the top, put the plastic bowl in the top of your vase to make sure it will fit with the top of the bowl nearly flush to the top of the vase.

Cut a piece of floral foam that can fit inside your bowl.

You’ll want to completely saturate it so it will keep the flowers alive. To do this, fill your sink with water. Put the piece of foam in the water, allowing it to float on top. As it becomes saturated, it will sink. It needs to soak for about 2 minutes before it will be ready to use. When it’s ready, put it in the bowl.

Next, you’ll prepare your flowers for placement. Remove the leaves and trim the stems at an angle to about 6″ long.

Push the stem of the first flower directly into the middle of the floral foam. This will be starting point for the dome shape you’ll eventually create.

Add flowers to create a dome shape from that central point. Some flowers will stick out toward the side and some diagonally. When you insert one flower, turn the vase 180 degrees and place another flower opposite it on the other side of the arrangement, like this:

You’ll still need to be careful as you’re making holes in the floral foam, because once you make a hole, it’s there for good. Push the flower stem as deep into the center of the foam as you can.

As you’re building the dome shape, continue to turn the vase to make sure that you’re making it as symmetrical as possible. It sounds more difficult than it is. When you’ve added all the flowers, you should wind up with something like this:

Notice you can still see the foam and the bowl, albeit barely. The point is not to be able to see them at all. This is why you’ll need greenery, which you can buy or, like me, cut from plants near your home.

You can add as much greenery as you would like. Just try to cover up the bowl and foam as best you can.

That’s it! Really, that’s all there is to it. Making a beautiful arrangement doesn’t require perfection. Just a little bit of patience and a willingness to experiment. You can use anything from cranberries to decorative stones, marshmallows, corks, cinnamon sticks or tinsel inside your vase, and flowers of any color.

This arrangement will live on the entry table right at my front door.

Do you plan to try making a floral arrangement? If you do, I’d love to see how it turns out!

DISCLOSURE: I am a member of the Walmart Moms program. Walmart has provided me with compensation for sharing my floral arrangement with you. Participation is voluntary and, as usual, all opinions are my own.

© 2008-2011 Green Your Decor. Do not republish any items from this feed without permission.

In general, I stay far away from traditional Christmas decor. You’re not going to find red, green and gold with images of Santa and elves at our house. We pride ourselves on choosing a non-traditional color scheme for our holiday decor each year. But as you can imagine, it can be difficult to find pre-made items in color schemes like turquoise and lime green, orange and white, or what we’ve chosen this year, lilac, gold and creme. So I’ve resorted to making my own decor, including wreaths. However, I have gotten tired of starting from scratch every year. So this year, I bought an undecorated wreath form from Walmart and made it my own. Here’s how you can do the same:

You’ll Need:

• Wreath, $4
• Large decorative picks, $3.47/each
• Small decorative picks, $1.97/each
• Decorative ribbon with wire edges, $3.97
• Ornaments, $10-13

*Get a shopping list on page 5 of the Walmart Christmas catalog

First, I added the ribbon at the top as the main focal point of the wreath. You don’t need to be skilled at tying fancy bows to do this. The ribbon has wire running through both edges, so it will hold any shape into which you fold it.

Keep folding and wrapping the ribbon until you have a bow shape that you like.

I also added ribbon at the bottom.

The next step is adding the picks. I wound up using just the small picks, because the large ones were a little TOO large and wound up overpowering the entire wreath. But the smaller picks are the perfect scale. Simply push the stem of the pick between the leaves of the wreath.

Finally, I added ornaments, interspersed throughout the gold picks for a balanced look. I initially bought glass ornaments, but I thought putting easily breakable ornaments on a wreath that would hang on our front door might be a bad idea. Instead, I grabbed some shatterproof ornaments in purple, along with some simple ornament hooks.

Add a hook to the ornament, and push it through the leaves of the wreath. You can wrap it around the branches to make sure it is extra secure.

Finally, you can add ribbon at the bottom center of the wreath to finish it off. I wrapped the ribbon around the wreath a few times, then left the ends hanging.

This was ridiculously easy to do. It took only about 20 minutes, and next year, I can just remove the ribbon, ornaments and picks to make way for our new color scheme. Isn’t it gorgeous on our front door?

We’re going to use the glass ornaments and the remainder of the shatterproof ornaments on our tree, which we will get in the next week or two. Given that we change our color scheme yearly, it’s great to know that we can rely on Walmart to find ornaments and decor inexpensively, and that, if well taken care of, they’ll last for years to come for ornament exchanges with friends and family.

I also plan to DIY some ornaments and Christmas decor, so I’ll share more of that once I get started.

DISCLOSURE: I am a member of the Walmart Moms program. Walmart has provided me with compensation for sharing my wreath project with you. Participation is voluntary and, as usual, all opinions are my own.

© 2008-2011 Green Your Decor. Do not republish any items from this feed without permission.

Things aren’t like they used to be. Once upon a time, we used to get tons of Christmas card from friends and family members. Today, we get a handful of cards from a handful of people every year. I’ve always thought we should do something to display the cards we do receive, but I could never come up with a good way to do it. Until now.

With this awesome project, you can display your favorite holiday cards and even photo cards featuring your own family. And the best part? It’s super simple.

You’ll Need

• Bare branches
• Ribbon
• Photos or cards
• Glue
• Red spray paint

You may remember that I like decorating with branches. In fact, I used them on my Christmas mantel a few years ago, as you might remember. I have kept those branches ever since, and this was a great opportunity to reuse them.

However, if you’re starting from scratch, be sure to remove any leaves from the branches and clean them properly.

Next, spray paint the branches with red paint. I recommend using Krylon H20 or some other low-VOC paint.

Set the branches aside to dry. I let mine dry for a full day to make sure they wouldn’t be tacky when moving to the next step.

Next, you’ll need to cut 2-3″ strips of ribbon. If you have 10 photos or cards to display, cut 10 strips.

Fold each piece of ribbon in half and glue the ends together. Be sure that the glue is dry before moving on to the next step.

Flip your cards over so the backs are facing you. Glue a loop of ribbon to the top center of the back of each card. Allow the glue to dry fully.

In the meantime, arrange your branches on your mantel. This is the trickiest part. It can be though to make them stay on the mantel, so make sure they are secured with tape or twine or weighted down so they won’t topple once you start adding cards.

Once the glue is dry, hang your cards on the branches using the loops of ribbon.

Fill in any additional spaces with Christmas ornaments — preferably shatterproof ones.

You’re done!

I’m so looking forward to getting new holiday cards this year so we can put them on display!

DISCLOSURE: I am a participant in the Walmart Moms program. Walmart has provided me with compensation for sharing this project with you. Participation in this program is voluntary. As always, all opinions are 100% authentic and mine.

© 2008-2011 Green Your Decor. Do not republish any items from this feed without permission.

Back in 2008, when I first started this blog and began pushing my family toward a greener lifestyle, one of the first changes we made was our cleaning products. Perhaps that’s because this was an obvious change. After all, when you’re almost knocked out by the fumes emanating from the products you use to clean your bathroom, there’s a clear need to do something differently.

That’s not to say the change happened overnight. It took us a while to find green cleaning products that were equally as effective as the ones we were used to. Then it was a challenge finding those products in stores at all. But I’m happy to say that more than four years later, there’s really no excuse for me to use traditional cleaning products, because there are a few eco-friendly options available most grocery stores. Among my favorites of those readily available products is the Mrs. Meyers product line, which, I now can happily report, is available at many Walmart stores throughout the country as well as online. This is the kind of change that made me want to become a Walmart Mom, because now, products like Mrs. Meyers will be available to the average shopper who may never have considered buying an eco-friendly cleaning product otherwise.

Anyway, Mrs. Meyers has a real knack for making products that make me want to clean. Because frankly, they smell awesome! My favorite scents are lavender and lemon verbena, and I would happily use either in every room of my home for any cleaning task. For example, this past weekend, my hubby and I cleaned the kitchen with the lemon verbena counter cleaner, shown below with the lavender laundry detergent. I wish I could bottle the scent and send it to you through the computer. My husband left the house and returned hours later, and the first thing he said when we walked through the door was how great the house smelled.

Now, I’m not saying that awesome scents alone make a cleaning product effective, but if you add a lasting, naturally derived fragrance to a product that is already incredibly effective, you’ve pretty much got my dream product. At least in my mind, my house doesn’t “feel” clean if it doesn’t smell good too, and peroxide, baking soda and vinegar fail miserably at making the house smell good.

The best part? ALL of the Mrs. Meyers products are like this. The hand soap? Awesome. The all purpose and toilet bowl cleaners? Fantastic. But the products that truly surprised me were the laundry products. The lavender laundry detergent is so concentrated that it requires just a single tablespoon per load. Yes. A tiny tablespoon. I’m not going to lie: I couldn’t wrap my mind around that for the first load and I used quite a bit more than that. But to give the product a fair shot, I used it as directed. Just one tablespoon for my next full load of laundry. And lo and behold, it worked just as well as when I’d used a lot more. Having used it for several loads, I have to admit that my habit is still to use more than the recommended amount, but that’s a habit I’m working hard to break, because it’s an unnecessary waste of product.

I also tried two Mrs. Meyers cleaning products that I’d never used before: The surface scrubber and the toilet bowl cleaner. Check out this video to see how they did:

Add to all of this the fact that I can easily pick up Mrs. Meyers products when I’m already shopping for groceries, and that they’re reasonably priced, and it’s easy to understand why we’ve been using them for years and why we will continue to use them to keep our home clean and smelling fabulous without toxic chemicals and noxious fumes.

If you’re looking for Mrs. Meyers products in your area, you can actually use the store locator at their website to find out which Walmart stores carry at least 5 of their products. If all else fails, though, you can order them at Walmart.com. Trust me when I say that they’re worth trying. (aff)

DISCLOSURE: I am a participant in the Walmart Moms program. Walmart has provided me with compensation for sharing Mrs. Meyers products with you. Participation in this program is voluntary. As always, all opinions are 100% authentic and mine.

© 2008-2011 Green Your Decor. Do not republish any items from this feed without permission.

The room in our apartment that we have the most trouble keeping clean and organized is, sadly, our master bedroom. The living room is straightened and de-cluttered pretty much every day, and I clean the kitchen daily too. But I guess since most of our time there is spent sleeping, we just don’t focus much on keeping the bedroom so clean. And the closet? Well, lets just say it was a disaster area:

We’d take off shoes and toss them on the closet floor, and lots of other miscellaneous things wound up in there that I can’t even explain, really. Plus, my crafting corner. Yeah. It was terrible. Let’s just say I have a LOT of craft supplies and finding someplace to put them all when I don’t really have a dedicated crafting area was a challenge. So they wound up in this corner of the closet:

I’m ashamed.

The worst part is that last year, I made a huge effort to clean up my closet. Clearly, it didn’t last. So when Walmart offered me an opportunity to get my closet in order — again — courtesy of the organizational products of my choosing, I jumped at the chance. And boy, am I glad I did. Before I get into the details, I’ll gratify you with an “after” photo:

Better, no?

In my opinion, this photo doesn’t do it justice. It took literally hours of work to get it that way, but it was totally worth it to be able to walk ALL THE WAY into my closet without tripping over anything .

First, the shoes. I admit it. I have too many pairs. So does my husband. So they overflowed everywhere and we never put them back where they belonged even though we already had two shoe racks on the floor and one on the back of the closet door from last year’s makeover. This 16-pair shoe rack from Canopy solved that problem easily:

We decided that I’d get the new rack while my hubby would keep the two floor racks. I put away all my shoes, including my tall boots on the hard top of the rack, and I had a couple of empty spaces left over — which of course, must be filled. Consignment sales, here I come! I kid…sort of.

Next, the closet shelves. As much as I love our mid-century bedroom furniture, the fact is that the dresser drawers are pretty shallow and my hubby’s clothes are really big. So he had a lot of overflow that wound up on the closet shelves. I used open storage bins from Canopy to sort and fold the extra clothes.

I still need to label each bin accordingly, but I’m trying to figure out an attractive, durable, permanent way to do it that doesn’t involve a Magic Marker. The best part about these bins, and almost every Canopy product I used in this makeover? They’re all made of recycled PET plastic bottles! This picture is the label from another product, but they are all made of the same thing. Score one for the green team!

Once the shoes and extra clothes were handled, there was little left to be done. Except. Yes. The crafting corner.

It took me a long while to figure out how to sort the mess. I eventually decided on covered, stackable storage boxes, also made of recycled PET plastic. I used one large bin to corral all my fabric (and there’s quite a bit of it).

The second large box was used to contain a bunch of shoeboxes that I used to sort items. For example, one shoe box contains paintbrushes and stamps, another contains craft paint, and still another contains wooden and metal items like curtain clips, craft sticks, etc. Finally, I have a plastic container for all of my sewing supplies: Needles, thread, etc.

Can you believe how much better it looks?

I did a lot of purging, getting rid of shoes and clothes that are outdated, too big (have you read about my weight loss journey at Green & Gorgeous?), or just never worn. They were sorted into two piles: One to consign at my favorite consignment store and another to donate to the Salvation Army or Goodwill. I also replaced some of the bent plastic hangers holding suit jackets and fancy dresses with these babies:

These hangers are covered in velvet (or velvet-like fabric, anyway) and they’re nonslip. Big bonus, and they make things look really nice and neat.

Also in the hanging department, I want to hug the person who invented this:

It is a scarf and tie hanger and it has already saved me so much frustration! My hubby has more than a few belts and ties, and we’ve always just slung them over a hanger, and that hanger always gets lost whenever he needs a belt or a tie. And me? I have more than a few scarves. In fact, I think I have a bit of a scarf problem. This simple product has solved the problem so elegantly that I actually plan to go to Walmart to grab two more so I can do a better job of organizing my scarves by color.

And last, but not least, we needed a better way to manage our laundry. So just outside the closet door, we set up this awesome hamper:

It includes four bags so clothes can be sorted as they’re dumped. This will save me SO much time on laundry days! It’s empty at the moment because we’d just finished doing laundry, but I’m actually looking forward to getting some dirty clothes so I can put this to work!

Its fellow workhorses are two laundry baskets, which we sorely needed. I’ve spent many Sunday afternoons walking loads of clean clothes from the dryer clear on the other side of the apartment to my bedroom. Which generally leads to lots of dropped items. Which is a real pain in the butt. These baskets have one curved side so that they can fit comfortably on a hip. Small detail, but I think it makes a big difference.

All of these products helped me take my closet from this disaster zone:

To this:

I can now actually walk into my closet again. And assuming we actually put our shoes away every day, it should be a lot easier to keep it looking this way

Here are the products I used (aff):

• Canopy Velvet Hangers
• Canopy Medium Storage Bins
• Canopy Collection Lidded Boxes (Small & Large)
• Canopy 4 Bin Sorter
• Mainstays Scarf Holder (Chrome)

DISCLOSURE: I am a participant in the Walmart Moms program. Walmart has provided me with products to use in my closet makeover and compensation for my time and effort on this project and post. Participation in this program is voluntary. As always, all opinions are 100% authentic and mine.

© 2008-2011 Green Your Decor. Do not republish any items from this feed without permission.

I’m not going to lie. Lately, doing projects around the house has been the last thing on my mind — particularly if said project is at all time consuming. Enter Walmart‘s Projects Made Simple series. If you’ve never heard of it, the name is a very good descriptor. Projects Made Simple is a series of DIY projects that come with video instructions and step-by-step guidelines for getting them completed. Included are small projects like painting an accent wall and installing a towel bar, and larger projects like staining a deck. This week, I chose to tackle a smaller project in my daughter’s room: I turned a section of wall in her room into a chalkboard!

If you use Pinterest or read home design blogs at all, you know that chalkboard paint is pretty popular, particularly for families with kids. After all, what child wouldn’t enjoy having free license to write on the walls, right?

This is what my daughter’s room looked like before we started:

And here’s Walmart‘s video showing you how to get it done:

This is what the room looked like when we were done:

I chose to paint a small section of wall between my daughter’s closet and her bathroom door. Just enough space for her to get creative, but not large enough to compete with the turquoise paint on the wall perpendicular to it. Clearly, my daughter is really captivated by her new chalkboard, and she’s begging me to use it. Too bad we have to wait a few days before we can “condition” the wall (essentially color all over it with chalk, then wipe it off before you actually start using it regularly).

Because Walmart already gave you an instructional video, I made a simple time-lapse video, set to music, that makes about an hour of work look like a 97-second walk in the park. Just like TV…lol! Check it out:

Forgive my outfit. These are my “official” painting clothes

Honestly though, this project was very easy to do. My steps were simple:

1. Remove existing art from the wall.
2. Tape off the section to be painted, including floor and wall molding.
3. Roll on one relatively thick coat of chalkboard paint.
4. Cut in corners with a paintbrush.
5. Follow with 2 light touch-up coats.
6. Pull the tape immediately after the final coat, while the paint was still wet.
7. Wait patiently to be able to use the chalkboard wall.

I have some ideas for great images to draw on the new wall, so I’ll be back in a few days with a TRUE “after” shot once we can actually use it!

DISCLOSURE: I am a participant in the Walmart Moms program. Walmart has provided me with compensation for my time and effort on this project and post. Participation in this program is voluntary. As always, all opinions are 100% authentic and mine.

© 2008-2011 Green Your Decor. Do not republish any items from this feed without permission.

Yeah…so you may have noticed that Green Your Decor hasn’t exactly been active lately. I have no excuse. Life just happened. On any given day, I’m working on half a dozen different things, and it doesn’t leave as much time for blogging as I would like. I wish I were writing this to say that I’ll be going back to a daily posting schedule. But the truth is, after about 2 years of infrequent posting, I’ve admitted to myself that’s not going to happen.

However, I’m not quite willing to throw in the towel yet. I will still write, but only when I do a project or truly have something to say. For the past several months, I’ve tried to force myself to write just for the sake of getting something new published. Yeah…that didn’t work. Those posts felt forced, and I’d rather not write at all than to write junk.

So for those of you who may have been wondering what happened, I’m still alive and kicking. I’m also blogging more often at my other blog, Green & Gorgeous, where I have more freedom to write about more of my everyday life since the niche isn’t as narrow as it is here. So if you’d like to keep up with me, my family, and my weight loss journey, head over to Green & Gorgeous and subscribe over there. You can also follow me on Instagram ( jennaepetersen ) to see pics of my daily adventures.

And trust, I will write here occasionally. Just not as frequently as I used to. I have a post coming later today (with video) about a small project I just did in my daughter’s room. So look out for that, and feel free to contact me if you have post ideas or just want to say hi. I’m still around.

© 2008-2011 Green Your Decor. Do not republish any items from this feed without permission.