Archive - September, 2011

Ch-ch-ch-changes

September 30, 2011 in Dining Room, Downstairs Bath, family room/office, Guest Bedroom, Kitchen, Laundry, Living Room, Master Bedroom, Projects with 10 Comments

When I first started blogging, I thought maybe it would be fun to document and show off all the home decor and crafty projects I ‘d be doing anyway. I had no idea that my little project-completing engine would be hurled into overdrive. I’m so motivated by the desire to always have more new and interesting projects to share with y’all! I’m awestruck when I think about how many projects I’ve tackled just since I started blogging.

Can you believe that this was my entryway for the first year that we lived in this house?

And just look at it now (sporting a new bench and shelf)…

I took the porch from this…

To this (after I added a mailbox,painted the door, added plants, brought in art, stripped the original hardware, and finally spray painted the deadbolt to match the knob and lockplate)…

In the living room, I made a zebra-print floorcloth, constructed a shelf out of a floorboard I found on the side of the road, brought in a vintage quilt, made a pouf, and am almost done reupholstering the wing chairs. (not to mention some smaller projects, like a throw pillow, some wall art, and patterned coasters)

Before:

After:

The dining room isn’t quite as dramatic, probably because I’d already brought in the dropcloth slipcovered sofa, leaning bookshelf, blue painted dresser, and floating wall shelves before I started blogging. But even with all that work already done I’ve tweaked it by switching out the coffee table and painting it mustard yellow, creating a set of eclectic dining chairs, and swapping the tablecloth for a fringed burlap runner.

Before:

Dining Room

After:

There are lots of smaller projects in here as well, like the paper garland on the dresser, the fabric flower pillow I made using a brooch that I wore with my wedding dress, and the acorn silhouette I made just last week.

The kitchen is woefully stagnant. Nothing has changed at all, but I’ve got big plans for this space, like painting over the fleshy beige, adding some upper cabinets on either side of the stove, and opening up that awkward pass-through to create a casual eating area. I just gotta save up some moolah, which isn’t easy when I’m always blowing through my monthly home improvement budget to fund more projects to blog about.

The laundry room was so sad before I started blogging that I didn’t even include it in the original house tour. But Nick and I painted it blue and switched out those awkward cabinets for some open shelving that spans the full width of the space, adding tons of personality and function.

Before:

Laundry Room

After:

Upstairs, in the master bedroom, we got new bedding, reupholstered the hope chest, painted the armoire and chest of drawers, made a little chalkboard message area, put curtains on the fifty billion windows, added flair with some homemade throw pillows, and brought in some art.

Before:

Master Bedroom

After:

Even the rooms we’re not really focusing on got a little love, like new hardware in the guest room…

Before:

After:

Some fabric organization in the office…

Before:

After:

And a new shower curtain (with ribbon detail), bath mat, and art wall in the downstairs bath…

Before:

After:

I’ve been a busy lady these last seven months! I just can’t believe how quickly things have changed. The whole house just has so much more personality now. A few years ago, I couldn’t have cared less about home decor. But something about having a house awakened the creative bug in me and I’ve had so much fun discovering and refining my personal style (luckily I had a rental house to practice on first–imagine lime green bedroom walls and all my stuff from college. I’m glad those days are behind me). I’m sooooo excited to see what the house looks like six months from now. Maybe I’ll finally have saved up enough dough for some upgrades in the kitchen? Or be decorating a nursery (for the child I have yet to conceive)? Only time will tell, but you can bet I’ll be blogging about it.

P.S. check out the house tour page for more pics of each room!

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Five Home Decor Standbys

September 29, 2011 in Projects with 8 Comments

Behold, my top five types of accessories that I use over and over again, in every room of my house.

Books

They’re cheap and plentiful at libraries and thrift stores. I look for hardbacks with colorful covers hiding under the dust jackets, then stack them up wherever my heart desires.

Baskets

I look for them at Goodwill, discount/dollar stores, and on sale at Hobby Lobby, then use them to corral random crap and add some natural texture to the room.

Whatnots

I get a lot of my random little whatnots from thrift stores. You’d be surprised at some of the awesome little knicknacks hiding amongst those shelves. And a lot of things that aren’t obviously awesome can be made so by a coat of paint. I had to talk myself out of buying a solid wood 12-inch tall pineapple finial for $8 today. I was envisioning it painted glossy white, and I’m still thinking about going back for it tomorrow…”Found objects” from places like Pottery Barn are such a rip off. Go out and find stuff yourself and save a lot of moolah. When it comes to which whatnots catch my fancy, I’m particularly into anything anything silver, white, or glass. Extra points if it reminds me of something meaningful.

Framed Photos

Framed photos just add so much personality and a sense of home. I get my frames from Ikea, thrift stores, and dollar/discount stores, and my photos from either Snapfish (for pics I’ve taken myself or snagged from friends) or through the professional photographers at friends’ weddings. I was in four weddings in one year, including my own, so Nick and I are lucky enough to have kind of a lot of professionally taken photos of us together. Tip: if you’re going to be standing in a wedding, go out of your way to be helpful and friendly to the (probably stressed) photographer. I bet you ten dollars you’ll be rewarded with a few really nice pics of yourself (and your date).

And finally…

Throw Pillows

I usually make them myself, but I do buy them occasionally if they’re under twenty bucks or so. I love throw pillows for the pop of color and pattern they add to space with minimal commitment, plus they’re so comfy!

Six months ago, I would have put plants on this list, but I’ve given up on keeping them alive. There are only two plants left inside of the probably dozen that I’ve had in the last year: rosemary and aloe. I rarely water either and they seem to like it that way.

What are your accessorizing standbys? Large statement pieces? Candles? Mirrors? Plants?

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DIY Wine Cork Bathmat

September 28, 2011 in Downstairs Bath, How To, Projects with 15 Comments

297 corks

4 hot glue gun burns

one laceration

a whole lotta hot glue

Y’all, I finally made the wine cork bath mat that I’ve been talking about for months. My friend Jen works at a fancy schmancy restaurant in New Orleans (where they apparently pop a lotta bottles of wine) and gave me a HUGE paper bag full of corks last time I saw her. Seeing as I’ve only managed to accrue about six corks on my own in the months I’ve been collecting them, Jen’s donation was a major boon to the project.

I gathered my supplies: a gripping rug pad, my bag of corks, my hot glue gun, and glue sticks.

I’d been cooped up inside all day working on the wing chairs, so I chose to tackle this project on the porch. I needed some fresh air.

Look at all those corks!

I started at one end of the rug pad and just started testing out different ways to arrange the corks.

Once I was happy with the look, I glued it down cork by cork, then starting laying out the next row.

Then another. I didn’t have a set pattern, I just sort of winged it as I went.

And another, and another, and another…this was sort of a repetitive project. Dachshund present for scale.

You know what’s kind of crazy? Every row came out to be exactly 21 corks, no matter how I arranged it. Except for one that was a little wonky–that one only had 20.

Eventually I got tired of the definitely-not-fall temperature outside and moved the whole operation to the living room. But it looks like my hot glue was bleeding through the rug pad and onto the porch floor. I had to pull pretty hard to get it up, and a little bit of the rug pad was left behind. Inside I worked on a piece of cardboard and reached under the rug to loosen it every row or two, before the glue could completely dry.

And about an hour later, ta-da! I ran out of corks before I got to the end of the 2×3 rug pad. Can you believe it? 300 corks and still not enough.

I walked away for a little while midway through this project and by the time I came back Pistachio had dislodged four of the wine corks for her personal pleasure. Looks like this thing needed some cat-proofing. I went back over the entire rug and glued each cork to the ones around it. You may want to do this even if you don’t have pets, as it made the whole thing a lot more sturdy.

You’ve been foiled, Hitler cat.

There were a few gaps, so I used a sharp knife to slice a few corks up into smaller pieces to jam in wherever needed.

If you know me well you will not be at all surprised to hear that I thought I didn’t need a cutting board to cut my corks, I could just carefully hold them as I sliced. Then I sliced my thumb. I took a picture, but my friend Lauren told me people might not like to see a picture of my bloody thumb. So just imagine. And don’t worry, I’m fine.

l wasn’t a big fan of the pieces-jammed-in look, so I used them sparingly and only when really needed. But now that I have the rug in my bathroom I notice that I can’t even find the spots where I filled holes, but the remaining empty spaces are glaringly obvious to me. So I’ll probably be going back and stuffing some more little cork pieces in there.

I cut off the excess rug pad and carefully moved the rug to the bathroom. It’s very stiff and really doesn’t transport very well. It kind of snapped in half while I was carrying it, but when I laid it down flat it looked perfectly fine.

See how obvious the empty areas are? I’m definitely going to go back and fill them in.

I’m muy happy with how it looks in the room.

Next up: ruffling up a little more ribbon and permanently attaching it to the shower curtain, since it’s all still held on with pins (read about that project here). Also, replacing those towels with something more colorful to contrast the all black and white space. I got those towels from my wedding registry. At the time Nick and I were in a rental house and had no idea what the bathroom situation would be once we got our own place, so it seemed smart to go neutral. I’m really glad I did that because our upstairs bathroom A) is tiny and B) has red walls, so towels with a lot of color or pattern would probably just be too much in there. Since this bathroom is bigger and a lot more neutral, I can have a little more fun with it. Plus, since this is a guest bathroom slash someday maybe kids’ bathroom, it’s nice to bring in a little more punch and personality.

How adorable are these (from Anthro)?

Anthropologie

But of course they’re pricey. Maybe I could just get the hand towels ($18 each) and then get some more reasonably priced bath towels that coordinate? Simple, clean, white bath towels are always a good bet and easy to come by. Fun, poppy hand towels and clean white bath towels and wash cloths? What do you think?

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Wing Chair Reupholstery Update

September 27, 2011 in Projects with 9 Comments

I spent the majority of this weekend toiling away at reupholstering my wing chairs. They’re still not done, but the end is now in sight. Here’s where we stand:

Looking pretty good, if I do say so myself. The cushion cover on the chair on the left is about 75% done. It still doesn’t have a bottom or a zipper on the back.

And both chairs are still missing the little pieces that hide the mess at the front of the arms. The covers require piping, and all my piping efforts have thus far been devoted to the cushion covers.

Speaking of piping, I taught myself how to make it and to attach it to fabric. Here’s the bottom piece of that half-finished cushion cover.

I had a lot of trouble attaching the back piece on chair #1, and a few weeks later it’s falling apart. Looks like I’m going to have to re-strategize. I’m thinking of cutting a piece of cardboard to match the curve of the chair, gluing the fabric over it, then stapling it to the chair from underneath.

I left the back of chair #2 open for now until I’m sure about my cardboard plan.

Both chairs still need to have their bottoms covered up, which is the very last step after every other piece that wraps under the chair has been stapled. I’ll just use some scrap muslin for this after I’ve got the back situation sorted out.

Looking at the chairs now compared to how they were before inspires me so much to keep going. I feel like I can see the light at the end of the tunnel!

Wow, I really haven’t rearranged my shelf much in the last three and a half months since this photo was taken. If it ain’t broke don’t fix it, I always say. Those mauve velvet chairs, on the other hand, were definitely in need of some TLC and I’m sooo happy to finally be seeing a change. I don’t usually do well with large projects that can’t be completed in a day or two, so I’m kind of impressed with myself for coming back to these babies weekend after weekend and little by little getting it done. The only major hurdle left: teaching myself to sew a zipper. I’m shaking in my skinny jeans just thinking about it.

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