The Interior DIYer

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How to [re]stock a bar cart on a budget

Some of you may consider it deceptive. Some, straight up cheating. I consider it just a little white lie. I’m going to let you in on my little secret for how I [re]stock our bar cart leading up to the festive season without burning a hole in our bank account. Because let’s face it, being merry ain’t cheap. 

There’s no better place to introduce you to my idea than where it originally began; one Christmas my parents were entertaining a snooty guest who was preaching about his delicate palette and how it can tell the difference between top brands vs. cheap brands of liquor. As he was bragging, little did he know the ‘Crown Royal‘ he was sipping was simply a cheaper brand of whiskey carefully poured into a Crown Royal bottle. And that is how my parents pwned said guest. Able to taste the difference, are you? *insert troll face here*

I’d say my parents did this to stick it to him, but it got me thinking about our own bar cart and how expensive it can be to stock it. With the festive season upon us, the price of entertaining is daunting. One way you could save a few euros is by bluffing your booze; refilling fancy bottles you may have with a cheaper brand that is of equal taste. You could wait until a top brand is reduced or on special price, buy it for the sake of the bottle, and simply refill it with a cheaper substitute after it runs out. It’s not lying. I’m not telling you to refill it with brown water. You’re putting the same thing into a slightly different bottle, because that fancy bottle costs an extra €20. It’s sticking it to the system, man.

This will work with most liquor brands. It works best with rum, whiskey, gin, creamed liquors and vodka to name a few. There are a few however that you can’t really mimic. Fancy gold Smirnoff I impulse bought a couple of months ago [there it sits, hardly touched. Because it’s too pretty]. Any specifically flavoured drinks – orange chocolate flavoured Baileys, lime Smirnoff etc. Bluffing the likes of these will be near impossible, so you’ll likely need to buy the top brand. But for the rest; I got your back. I’ll keep your secret if you keep mine xx

p.s. Two years ago I tried my nannie’s knock-off Baileys recipe. If you’d like to try your hand at it, please do! It’s incredible and you wouldn’t know the difference. I’ll be trying a vegan version of it this year, in a very small batch. Because it could either turn out vegan marvelous, or hella wrong.
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DIY Friday – copper blanket hanger

It seems like forever since I blogged a DIY project so I thought why not ease myself back into the swing of things with the most simplest of DIYs. Seriously simple, guys.  
The inspiration behind this project came from a blanket my grandmother crocheted for me. For the past couple of years I’ve unfortunately been storing it in a cupboard. I wanted to display it in some way, and here’s the kicker, in a way that would KEEP KITTENS OFF OF IT [as it’s white, their fur shows up to no end on it. Kitties have plenty of their own blankets so they’re not deprived]. A lot of thinking went into it, and I eventually thought “why not hang it up?“

I wanted to keep this hanger idea very simple. Copper is very big this year so I quickly came to the conclusion of using a copper pipe and some rope to create an incredibly basic yet pretty hanger. I did a quick mock-up using some thick black ribbon I had laying around, and I think I actually prefer it. I think it works better with and compliments the blanket vs. using a piece of rope that might be competing in texture and attention. 

FUNNY STORY – I kinda managed to blag this piece of copper pipe. As I was leaving a restaurant I noticed a gentleman working outside with quite a lot of copper pipes. I plucked up enough courage to ask if he had any leftover when he was finished, would he mind keeping a piece aside for me. We got talking and it turns out his other half also is forever collecting random pieces for projects, so he was well used to such requests o/ We were discussing sizes of pipe etc. when he found a piece about 2ft / 60cm long. “Here, just take this piece. Maybe hide it in your bag …“, so off I went with 2ft of copper pipe sticking out of my handbag and headed home! [thank you again so much, Donnacha!]
It’s a pretty self-explainatory DIY so I figured there was zero point in photographing steps. But just in case, here’s what to do … 
– get copper pipe
– get some heavy ribbon or twine
– thread through and knot securely
– hang up blanket
– the end

So there you have it! Really simple, but [I think] gives a big impact. Happy Friday, homies! Hope you have a lovely weekend lined up.
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Rebrandiversary – what’s in a name

It’s kinda hard to believe one year ago I made the leap to rebrand my blog. I say rebrand as if my website is an actual thing that’s taken seriously, but nevertheless it’s been a year since that little change and I can say it was possibly the best change I made around here. Before ‘The Interior DIYer’ my blog was called ‘Hydrangea Girl’. I know it was the right decision to change it because that last sentence makes me cringe to no end [if you’re particularly bored you can read why I changed the name here].

In the year since changing the name of my blog I’ve been offered some amazing opportunities. I’m not saying it’s down to the name change, but within the past year I became Woodie’s DIY guest blogger, was asked to jump on board as Image Interiors & Living’s DIY Expert, conducted interviews at the spring and autumn Colourtrend Interior Design Forum and wrote for a number of bloggers and brands; with Harvey Norman’s blog being one of the more recent. It’s mad! It could be coincidence and I’m not saying such brands wouldn’t have worked with me beforehand, but I mean come awn. I think having the name ‘The Interior DIYer’ helped a little. It’s what it says on the tin.

Hydrangea Girl will always be how I started and I’m not turning my back on the name I picked quickly one morning when I first started this blog. Robert recently wrote on a card to me “you’ll always be my Hydrangea Girl” [insert ugly crying here]. I don’t think I could forget it if I wanted! 
So if you’re thinking of changing the name of your brand or your site, my advice? …