DIY: Spray painted mirror

I am bringing you another DIY today. I recently was looking for a mirror that I could use for my dorm room that was pink. I was having trouble finding that color that I wanted, or pink anything for that matter, so I decided that I would just spray paint it.

Materials:

1. Your mirror (DUH)

2. Spray paint color that you would like to use (You will need two or three cans)

3. News paper so that you can cover your mirror so paint does not get on it.

4. Painters tape or masking tape to take down the news paper.

Step 1:

Begin taping off your mirror so that you wont get paint on anything except the white part. This is important so that you dont have to spend time afterwards trying to get paint off of the mirror.

Step 2:

Begin spraying your mirror with the paint. It is actually a lot easier that it might sound. It is going to take a lot of coats if you want it very opaque. Plus if you are like me and bought straight glitter paint it is going to take FOREVER to get done.

Step 3:

Let the paint dry and then peel off the tape as well as the newspaper. I forgot to take pictures after I did that but I did love the way it turned out.

Step 4:
If you did get paint on to your mirror you will want to take some sort of paint thinner or fingernail polish remover or something and use it to get the paint off the mirror.


I hope you guys all enjoyed this DIY if you have any more DIY requests or post requests please leave them in the comments.

~Kaylan

CollegeTime: Getting your Textbooks

Today is the day that I talk about the one thing that no one really wants to talk about, buying text books. There are actually a lot of options to make getting the textbooks cheaper, however after spending time today looking at all those other options I am going to give you my truthful and honest opinion.

GET YOUR BOOKS FROM YOUR BOOK STORE!!!

I know I am probably one of the only people that will tell you that, but seriously do it. It is a lot less of a headache, and not only that but there are many options that you can use to get your books. There are 4 basic options that you can choose from when you get books from your school's book store, or at least at my college there are. The options are rent used, rent new, buy used, buy new. Now I know that is a lot to take in, and you may be wondering what the heck each of them means. I know that I was clueless when the brought all of this stuff up at orientation, but I pretty much get the basics now.

Rent used: This is generally the cheapest way to get your books. You are renting it for a cheap price, it has already been used which makes it cheaper, and then you return it to the bookstore with no worries on keeping it. The problem I find with this is that there will probably be a LOT of writing, highlighting, page flagging, and what not other things to mark information. A lot of that information may not be useful to you and it can become a cluttered mess, however if you are looking for cheap this would work out well as it is the cheapest option.

Rent new: This is the next price up from renting used. You are renting the book for a cheap price and you get to write in it, highlight it, page flag it, and whatever else you want to do. Without having to worry about what other people put in it and what you were going to have to use to be able to distinguish between what you wanted to know and what the 10 people before you wanted to know. If you are looking for cheap new books I like this way. I actually did this with most of my books.

Buy used: This one is the nest price up from renting new. For obvious reasons this costs more because you are planning on buying the book to keep so they are going to charge you more. Again with this type of buying you have to remember that people have written and highlighted in it before you so it may get a tad bit confusing for you. If you are wanting to buy the book this is probably the best way to go about it.

Buy new: This is by far the most expensive way to get books. You are buying them, brand new. That means no one has used them. I would love to have the opportunity to do this with every book, however they are quite expensive this way. If you have the money to do it I say go for it especially if you are OCD or have issues working around what other people do in your book.

There are other ways that you can get books, like amazon and ebay, but the problem with those ways is that you are generally buying them, they may seem cheaper, but after shipping and waiting it is just easier to get them from your bookstore. Trust me, you dont want to be going off to college without your books because they got put on backorder because so many other people needed them. You might not need them the first day, but you more than likely will need them at some point.

I hope this helps. If you have any opinions of your own feel free to leave them in the comments.

~Kaylan

College Packing List

I am working on making my college packing list for myself and figured I might as well post it on here so that maybe you guys can get a little bit of help from it as well.

Bed

• Bed sheets
• Extra blankets
• Comforter
• Mattress cover
• Mattress pad (if your dorm beds arn't as comfy as ours)
• Pillows
• Pillowcases
• Under bed storage

Room

• Alarm clock
• bulletin board
• Dry Erase board
• DVD's
• Pictures
• Push pins
• Rug
• Television
• Video game consoles
• Decorations
• Calendar

Desk

• Desk lamp
• Glue
• Paper Clips
• Pens & Pencils
• Post-its
• Ruler
• Scissors
• Staple Remover
• Stapler
• Staples
• Tape
• Three-hole punch
• Waste Basket

Computer

• Cables
• Computer
• External hard drive
• headphones
• Laptop case
• Laptop Charger
• Mouse
• Surge protector
• USB Flash Drive

Class

• Backpack/tote bag
• Binders
• Calculator
• Folders
• Highlighters
• Index cards
• Notebooks
• Notepaper
• Textbooks

There are more items that I know are going to have to be brought, but these are currently the only ones that I am positive will be on my list. I will compile a list of everything I buy and pack when the time comes, for now I hope this helps everyone get started on their college shopping. If you have anything to add to this list please leave them in the comments.

~Kaylan

My addiction to planner organization

I was looking through my YouTube history last night and realized that I have a new addiction, planner organization videos. I couldnt tell you why, other than that I watched one and the rest just kind of followed it. So I figure I will share with you some of the good, and bad, things I saw in the videos that people were doing with there planners.

Good ideas:

• Color coding- This is actually a pretty good idea if you have a lot of stuff going on. I usually dont color code but I am trying to get into it because I know it is going to help me keep everything organized.
• Decorating- To an extent this is pretty awesome. Making your planner your own is one way to keep interested in doing it, but some people do go a tiny bit overboard in decorating their planners.
• Stickers- These are awesome too...if you can find them. I looked all over target and couldnt find stickers, which actually sucks big time because I really love stickers.
• Dashboards- These are nice and I actually made my own in the back of my new planner (post on that coming when I start using it more :) ).
• Post it flags- Color coordinating these helps make them a little more useful, but you can always find a way to use them even if they arnt color coordinated with anything. 
• Making your own inserts- I actually liked this idea because you can make the planner exactly what you want and not have to worry about not having the things you need in it. This is more easily done with planners with three rings, but it is do able with planners that are spiral bound.

Bad ideas-

• Decorating so much- Like I said, decorating can keep you interested in wanting to plan. Some people go way too over the top and decorate everything so much that it looks cluttered and like there isnt even any planning going on.
• A lot of stickers- I have seen bundles of stickers in planners actually look okay, but if you have about 12 million pink and purple owl stickers on one page just to decorate it then you need to slightly re-think you tactic. Unless you are like 13, then by all means add all the stickers you want, you wont be able to do it later in life.
• Color coordinating decorations- Okay this one annoys me sometimes, unless it is on the outside of you planner no one cares if your sticker color coordinates to what month it is. I am all for organization and decorating but this is just one I am not a fan of.

All in all most of the planner videos out on YouTube are actually really good, and if you are looking for those videos then go look them up and spend hours watching them, like I do. But if you dont want to go too far I am also going  to provide some tips for getting started with your planner.

1. Dont spend a lot of money on your first planner. Chances are you are either going to buy one you think you are going to like and end up hating it, or that you are going to have to spend a lot of time figuring out what kind of organization system works for you.
2. Spend time looking at what comes in the planner. Dont just buy it because its the first one you see or because someone on YouTube is using it. Spend time looking inside and making sure the spaces are big enough for you to write in and actually use it.
3. Make it your own. I love to decorate things and make them more me. There is absolutely nothing wrong with doing that for a planner too, just try to remember it is a planner, not a coloring book
4. Find a system that works. Color coding may not work for you just because it works for someone else. Try out different systems until you find one that works out well for you. Dont just settle because someone else uses that system. Be your own person!

There are my few tips for you about planners. If you have any questions or ideas about how to decorate planners, or even any tips about how to get started with one leave them in the comments.

~Kaylan

CollegeTime: Current Planner Thoughts

I filmed a video on my Iphone today showing you all my current planner that my mom bought be for college and telling you my thoughts on it. It is not all that organized because a) I have not started school and b) well you will see exactly how little amount of room to organize there is.

So if you wanted this in word form and didnt want to watch the video here we go.

My mom got me a planner while I was at student orientation without consulting me about what I would like in a planner. It has stickers and a lot of other things but other than that it is pretty small and pretty plain. The pros of the planner include: 

1. It is compact and could actually fit in my purse or bag and not take up much room
2. It comes with a few different types of stickers (though not enough to really be able to use them)
3. There is an academic calendar, final schedule, campus map, football schedule, and about a million other things that are nice to know.
4. There is a spot to write down your class schedule (if you just happen to forget what the heck you are doing one day
5. There are actually monthly and weekly views.

The cons of the planner include:

1. There really isnt enough room to write much of anything on the month view of the planner
2. There are not enough stickers (I love stickers)
3. There isnt really enough space to write anything through out
4. There are no ways to actually make it easier to organize
5. No tabs so that I can easily flip to what I want to get to

So in all It isnt exactly my most favorite planner in the world, but my mom bought it for me so I will try it. It will probably just turn into my personal planner that I use to keep track of when I am doing peoples hair or when someone wants to go to the mall. 

If you have any suggestions on planners that I might like you can leave them in the comments.

~Kaylan

CollegeTime: Early shopping

I dont know how many other people are really excited to start college but I know that my roommate Olivia and I are.We both started trying to do some early dorm shopping and let me tell you, it hasnt worked out the greatest for either of us. I figure that maybe everyone could benefit from my mistakes in trying to shop to early.

The fact that it is the middle of June made me think that buying things for college would actually be easy, and that most stores would have their college stuff out, oh no. I was wrong about that. EVERY store I went to had maybe three things total for college. It was one of those moments where I kind of wanted to cry because I was so excited to get my stuff for school and my dreams were shot down. Here are the stores I tried...and almost cried at:

This store was actually one of the biggest disappointments I had. They did have a few of their dorm bedding sets out as well as a few shower caddies. My only issue was that they had the smallest selection of bedding I have ever seen in my life. And the other problem I had was nothing was pink. I can not even begin to tell you the problems I have had finding things in pink. When I do finally find them none of the pink colors match. Needless to say I have not bought anything from Bed Bath & Beyond yet, though I hope I will be able to.

I had slightly more success here. They didnt have any of their dorm stuff out, but I did find a comforter, sheets, pillows, and blankets here that were all in pink. My comforter is black and white zebra bur it was on sale and I love zebra. So I could totally stand that its not pink. I also priced out some things for bathrooms as well as some storage items. I have to wait on those until the beginning of July when Olivia and I figure out exactly where our rooms are at. 

Walmart didnt have any of their dorm stuff out either, however they always have a lot of things for rooms so I did pretty well here as well. I got another pink fuzzy pillow, some bowls, a set of towels and washcloths, a mirror, and an alarm clock. It was still hard to find anything here in hot pink. So I bought a white mirror and I cam going to attempt to paint it the color I want. That will be a later post, I can promise that.

Those were the three stores I went to. And even though on paper it looks like the trip when well considering that is June, if you were there for it you would understand how hard it actually was to find anything I needed or wanted. Especially in the color I wanted.

~Kaylan

New background and Title

I spent the better part of 3 hours yesterday trying to figure out how to make backgrounds and headers for the blog. Let me tell you, it took a lot of work, but I am currently happy with the results of what I came up with. I dont know how everyone else feels about it and I am curious. so if you would like to leave your opinion please leave it in the comments. Ta ta for now.

~Kaylan

CollegeTime: Binders

Today's post is going to be all about decorating your binders for college. Now I know that its probably not a necessary post, but while I was making mine I took pictures, so I figured it would be something fun for me to do. So lets get started.

Materials:

1. BINDERS

2.Decorative paper

3. Solid colored, or plain paper

4. Markers

5. Glue

6. Tape

7. Creativity!!!

First thing is first. You are going to want to cut your paper down to a size that fits in your binder. I failed at that when I took this picture but I fixed it later. :)

Then you will want to add a little paper with the name of the class and the days of the week and the time and all that jazz. (I downloaded all my fonts from dafont.com )

Then you want to add decorations. For this one I attempted (key word is attempted) to make a cute little paper bow. If you want to see a tutorial on how to do this click here.

That is the basic of how you do it. Now here are some more pictures of my attempts at decoration other binders.

Dont try to use double sided tape to make a chevron pattern. Trust me on this one. It doesnt work.

It worked much better freehanding it with modpoge and glitter.

This one is probably my favorite. Its got a super cute mini paper bow :)

Finished version of the one I made for the instructions.

These both are for my TAM classes. Since they are fashion classes, I figured a fashion collage would be nice.

And finally the finished chevron one. This one wasnt dry enough to put in the binder when I took pictures, but its pretty cool.

I hope you guys enjoyed the post. Share your binder ideas in the comments. And if you have any requests for posts leave them there too.

~Kaylan

Graduation, College orientation, and more

Well Graduation was a few weeks ago and I have been running around like a crazy person since then. I finally found a little bit of time to just sit down and write some blog posts. So first I would like to apologize for not getting any posts out for a bit, but like I said, busy busy. Secondly I would just like to say that like the week after graduation I had my college orientation and it was actually surprisingly fun. And lastly I would just like to say that I am now working on some longer blog posts. So excuse this short update post. I promise the next two will be longer.