Giveaways & Product Reviews Archives - Makely School for Girls

Win a $150 Throw Pillow Giveaway from The Pillow Studio and Personal Room Styling from Me

by Lindsay Ballard on May 24, 2013

This is a post sponsored by The Pillow Studio.

I have a really warm, fuzzy place in my heart for throw pillows. If I didn’t have kids and pets (and a husband), I’d have about fourteen throw pillows on each of my sofas. The five I have now just end up on the floor anytime the kids/pets/husband walk into the room – an amazing feat since none of them own up to being the pillow tosser. I think they are in cahoots, or else I have magic pillows.

Living in a home full of pillow tossers, you’d think that I would quit buying pillows, right? Wrong! I will gladly pick them off the floor three times a day when I know what big changes they can bring to a room. A different color here, a different pattern there, and a fresh take on a room you have. Maybe pillows really are magic!

Today, I’m joining with designer and seamstress extraordinaire (and Makely reader!) Suzi from The Pillow Studio to bring you an amazing giveaway. She’s giving away $150 worth of handmade pillow covers from her shop and I’m helping you pick the best ones to help transform the room of your choice!

I’ve had such a hard time keeping this a secret, since Suzi and I are so excited about it! She makes stunningly gorgeous pillows from really beautiful designer fabrics. She’s a former nurse turned certified designer and workroom professional, which means she’s been trained to have a strict eye for those little details that make a big difference.

Filed Under: Giveaways & Product Reviews, Uncategorized

Ten Tips for Better Growing Grass + a $50 AmEx Gift Card Giveaway

by Lindsay Ballard on May 8, 2013 39 Comments

This is a sponsored post from Pennington Seed about using better growing grass seed to create a drought tolerant lawn.

As I tell you in just about every post, I live in Austin, Texas. I know I’ve described it as the hottest place on Earth and hotter than the surface of the sun. Those things are both true. And when you combine our summers of 100+ degree days and little to no rain, you have a recipe for big time drought.

Filed Under: Giveaways & Product Reviews 39 Comments

Decorate Yourself with Awesome and Cheap Fashion Jewelry from Everyday Icing + a Giveaway

by Lindsay Ballard on May 3, 2013 3 Comments

This giveaway is sponsored by Everyday Icing.

Many, many moons ago when I started this blog, I met a sweet friend named Kimba who blogged at A Soft Place to Land. She was sweet, funny, creative and REAL. ASPTL was literally one of the first blogs I’d check out each morning in my feed reader. It was such a delight.

Times change, family needs change and sometimes our lives change. Kimba took a week off of blogging to catch up on some things, and then she just didn’t come back. As sad as I was for her to disappear, I really respected her decision to walk away from a successful blog to focus on the other things in her life.

Well, Kimba is back, y’all! Imagine the “SQUEEEs!” that erupted when I saw her name in my inbox. She’s not blogging anymore, though. Instead, she’s started Everyday Icing, which is a an accessory auction on Facebook. Each Monday, about 30 items are posted on the Everyday Icing FB page, and they are all yummy, designer knock-off pieces at very non-designer prices – we’re talking mostly under $20, folks.

To let me get my hands dirty (so to speak), Kimba sent me a few pieces that they were about to have up for auction. Y’all. These things are just right up my accessory alley. They are light weight and perfect for when you don’t want to spend big bucks on a trend.

Filed Under: Giveaways & Product Reviews 3 Comments

Girl Time: Home Maintenance Lessons for Kids

by Lindsay Ballard on April 25, 2013 17 Comments

Disclosure: This is a sponsored post for Filtrete. I am proud to work with 3M and will be sharing more home maintenance information from 3M Filtrete in future posts. I was given key messages to share, but all the words and thoughts are my own…as is the darling little girl. I have been compensated for my time and for this post.

Back before our now 7-year old Zack was even born, my husband told me he wanted to teach him how to use tools the right way as soon as he was able to handle them. It was very important to Tom that Zack learn to be self-sufficient in all things DIY, like knowing how to wire electrical or change the oil in a car. Obviously, Zack wasn’t going to learn to do all of those things as a toddler, but Tom thought starting him off with the learning was a good start. Tom also told me he wanted to teach Zack how to jump off a roof the right way (there’s a right way?!?), but thankfully that hasn’t happened yet.

Filed Under: Giveaways & Product Reviews, Real Life with Lindsay 17 Comments

Happy Day! There’s a Silhouette Winner!

by Lindsay Ballard on April 21, 2013 Leave a Comment

This giveaway is sponsored by Silhouette.

Happy Sunday! This happens to be a particularly great day for three reasons:

1. I’m on my way back home from the SNAP! creative bloggers conference (which was AWESOME – pics and stories to come later this week), which means I get to tuck my babies into bed tonight;
2. My daddy’s birthday is today – Happy Birthday, Dad; and
3. We have a winner of the Silhouette Portrait!

Congrats go out to our winner:

a Rafflecopter giveaway
If you didn’t win (super sad face), you still have time to take part in the promotion that’s going on. If you use THIS LINK and Silhouette coupon code MAKELY, you can get these special savings:

This link and code will work until April 26th. Happy crafting!

Filed Under: Giveaways & Product Reviews Leave a Comment

Silhouette Portrait Giveaway + Silhouette Promo Code + Project = One Awesome Post

by Lindsay Ballard on April 18, 2013

This giveaway is sponsored by Silhouette.

I’m seriously obsessed with jewelry. It always fits, regardless of my pant size, right? I have a ridiculous number of earrings and I’ve never seen a statement necklace that I didn’t like. The problem is that I have so much that I don’t “see” most of it. Part of my closet renovation plan is to put together a better jewelry display so that everything is right in front of me.

Towards that end, I found an earring storage solution on Pinterest that was brilliant. Ice cube trays, folks! Isn’t that genius? I bought stackable ones at Target so that I could stack them up and have a smaller footprint in my closet.

I organized my earrings by metal tones, so I have one tray for gold, one for silver, and one for mixed metals. I thought it would be cute to label them, so I cut out labels from gold vinyl with my Silhouette Cameo.

Now, the ice cube trays – I mean earring trays – are labeled so I know what’s in each one. Cute and functional, right?

Gosh, I just love my Silhouette! If you’ve been in the market for one, Silhouette has a great promotion going on right now. With the code MAKELY, you can get special pricing on a Silhouette bundle and/or vinyl if you already have a craft cutter.

Here are the details for the discount running from April 18 – April 26 (You must use the Silhouette promo code MAKELY to get these prices):

· 1 Silhouette Portrait™ + 1 roll of black vinyl, 1 roll of white vinyl, and 1 roll of transfer paper: $139.99
· 1 Silhouette CAMEO® + 1 roll of black vinyl, 1 roll of white vinyl, and 1 roll of transfer paper: $269.99
· All premium vinyl is 25 percent off

Usually the vinyl is $14.99 for a 9″ x 10′ roll. Silhouette has recently reduced that price to $9.99 and you get an additional 25% off of that – HUGE savings! It’s essential half off of the old price.

>>>>>YOU MUST USE THIS LINK TO THE SILHOUETTE SHOP FOR THE CODE TO WORK<<<<<

And just in case you’d rather WIN a Silhouette…well, go right ahead. I’m giving away a Silhouette Portrait right here! To enter, follow my blog via a feed reader or get my posts delivered to your email inbox (links to do so are below in the Rafflecopter form). Fill out the form and you’ll be entered (if you are already reading on a reader, you need to click over to the blog itself to fill out the form). You can earn additional entries by tweeting, pinning and Facebooking this giveaway (you can do each once a day). The giveaway for a Silhouette Portrait will run through April 20th and is open to US residents only.

a Rafflecopter giveaway
Good luck!