never a dull day...

Creamy Distressed China Cabinet

2012-10-15T07:38:00.000-07:00

A couple of months ago when I returned Mrs R's

Not so Shabby Buffet & Bookcase

I came home with another project for her.

She had been given this well used China Cabinet,

who was in desparate need of a makeover!

This guy had potential.

But was living in a era of bad scroll-y hardware and medium oak finish.

Mrs. R requested the China Cabinet go Creamy

to match her newly painted buffet.

And she wanted the glass removed and chicken wire installed.

Easy Peasy.

(But I didn't have a CLUE about chicken wire!)

So I started with removing the glass from the doors.

'Cause I know demo!

First, I removed the door from the cabinet.

Then I started prying the inside trim piece off with a screw driver.

Then I grabbed the most handy of staple removing tools

(no idea what its called!)

And after I pulled all the staples I removed the glass.

Side note: I still don't know what to DO with the glass...

Anyone have any ideas for 2 curved glass panels?!?!

Once the doors were glass free, I started priming & painting.

Ahhhhh... this Oak-y China Cabinet looked a TON better!

Now look closely,

The foot areas on the cabinet had strange, recessed circles.

They didn't match the other lines on the cabinet.

They didn't improve the look of the cabinet.

They were just not good, or necessary.

So I erased them. With wood fill.

Much better!

Once painted all the details looked a TON better!

Unfortunately, I erased the distressing/glazing pictures.

(Head Palm Moment!!!)

So on to the "How to Install Chicken Wire"pictures.

Wander around your local Farm & Home store until you find a roll of this:

Silly me Chicken Wire has an official name.

"Hex Netting"

Who knew??

Unroll it carefuly.

I repeat, carefully!!

This stuff is SHARP.

A smart person would wear gloves.

I'm not smart.

Trim the razor sharp wire down to roughly the right size.

This tool is really all that worked for trimming.

Utility scissors did not.

Once trimmed, cram that wire into the slot where the glass once lived.

You will have to trim and cram.

Trim and cram.

And slice your fingers a few times to get it all done.

And you will have to of course do both doors.

Eventually you will succeed.

(I also used the staple gun to tack in the wire.)

YEA she's ready for hardware!

This is an important OOOPS picture.

It will forever remind me why

you should NOT drill holes

on doors until you reinstall the door.

SOMETIMES they hang funny.

And so even though you found the MIDDLE on BOTH doors

The middle is really not THE middle for BOTH doors.

*sigh*

Once this China Cabinet was

Distressed, Glazed, Wired...

She was pretty much unrecognizeable, which was a good thing!

Inside & Out this Creamy Distressed China Cabinet had a fresh new look!

O and did I mention I painted the back??

Yea, its a problem I have.

If I think furniture has the potential to be used somewhere, someday

where the back might be visible.

I paint it too...

For the curious, nope this is not DIY chalk paint.

This is good old latex & elbow grease.

Each little bit of distress was sanded off by me.

Its how I get my arm work out!

I love the feet without the circles!

I love the dentil molding now.

But I never love to paint it! :)

I wonder if this China Cabinet's previous owners

would even recognize her at Mr & Mrs's R's house now?!?

Linking up here!

Domestically Speaking, Stone Gable,

The Shabby Creek Cottage,

Miss Mustard Seed, Chic on a Shoestring Decorating,

Primitive & Proper

Painting Graphic Designs Part 2: A Painted Guitar

2012-10-05T09:33:00.003-07:00

Part 2 of this trend of painting objects I never considered painting,

was a Guitar.

Yes, a Guitar.

An actual musical instrument.

Not the painted Piano that's made me

A) want to buy a piano

B) paint want to paint a piano

A guitar is one of those rare things I had never dreamed of applying paint to.

So of course I said YES I'll paint the guitar.

And then the guitar was dropped off.

AND I got a little scared.

When I was told "acoustic guitar" I imagined wood.

Not black, shiny surface guitar.

Image VIA Guitar Center

I had to take a bunch of deep breaths before deciding where to begin.

I reached for the fabulous, green frog tape.

And covered that puppy up!

On the BACK side first.

Just in case this went horribly, horribly wrong.

And I had to repaint it black (somehow).

I decided the back side was the best side to experiment with!

So after I sketched a design on the green tape.

I started "operating" on it.

I trimmed away the green tape to reveal my swirling paisleys.

Then I used a tiny piece of sandpaper to rough up the surface of the guitar.

Sanding had to be done very gently.

Otherwise you would sand up the tape!

After sanding, I covered all the remaining surfaces (to avoid overspray)

Trash bagged the neck.

And said a quick please let this work prayer.

I first primed.

THEN came the multiple coats of bright red.

After minimal dry time (to avoid peeling paint) I started uncovering the guitar.

Removing tape was MESSY.

Red, sticky fingers, dangerous wet tape.

Not such an easy process.

BUT

slowly I found the pattern.

And it looked GREAT!

time for the flip side!!

Same process.....

1. Cover

2. Sketch

3. Trim

4. Sand and cover

5. Spray Prime

6. Spray Prime your leg

OK, you can skip step 6. :)

7. Paint & Peel

8. Admire....

I'm sure you've noticed that this guitar has a name.

"Cash".

Here's the scoop on "Cash".

Cash, after Johnny, of course!

Actually belongs to a 16 year old, guitar playing girl.

Cash was her first guitar.

Her mom snuck Cash away for me to paint.

As a 16th Birthday surprise.

On a tight time frame (one week)!!

Painting Cash took a lot of time.

And was quite nerve racking!

I had visions of a really angry 16 year old HATING painted Cash.

Relief came after the birthday surprise,

Cash's makeover was LOVED.

Soon he'll be hanging proudly on the wall!

So what's the most unique thing/surface you guys have painted??

Have I ever mentioned to anyone that I've also painted cars.

Yes, carS!

A truck and a Karmann Ghia.

Yep, I'm THAT crazy...

Painting Graphic Designs

2012-09-14T12:58:00.000-07:00

Just when you think that you have mastered most of the

tricks of decorative painting

someone will throw you a curve ball.

And ask you to paint something totally out of your element!

I've had this happen twice recently.

(You'll have to wait for #2!)

First up was a $5 table from Goodwill.

I was painting it for a friends daughter to use as her desk.

I waited for bedding selections to be made,

So I could come up with a design plan.

And then all the cutesy, fluffy girly stuff came to an end

When the daughter decided she wanted a EIU Panthers themed desk.....

Hmmmmmm said my brain.

(and yes, you could probably hear crickets)

It took awhile to come up with an idea.

And then it took awhile for me to get

the courage to paint something so graphic....

Here's how it went:

First I sanded, primed and painted the "desk" white.

And sketched my very first drawing of an EIU Panther.

Then I covered the areas UNDER my Panther lines with paint tape.

(Blue tape because I was out of my favorite green tape.)

Then I broke out the trusty exacto. And started slicing!

I cut thru my sketch AND the tape.

**Side Note: I was totally attempting to imitate a technique I saw over

at Design Sponge with Erin Scott's Typographic Idea Wall

So when I peeled up the paper and the tape I was left with this....

Rarrrrrr.

(Is that the noise a Panther makes???)

I painted the inside Panther black.

And peeled the remaining tape off.

Hellooooo Panther!

Now the EIU logo is actually blue & black.

And the "Inspiration" Panther logo I was imitating

had a thin, blue pin-stripe alllll around the Panther.

Of course, my Panther needed one too!

So again, I broke out the paint tape.

And outlined my Panther.

** Side Note: I actually used some of my previously

"trimmed" off paint pieces to keep the outline perfect!

So don't just wad those trimmed pieces up! They could come in handy!!

After round 2 of trimming and taping,

I had this...

I know, bad lighting. You can barely see the blue outline.

But I promise it's there!!

SO then I decided that was just not enough excitement on the desk.

I allllmost lettered "Panthers".

But that wasn't really a exciting design for this desk.

(In my opionion!)

I decided instead it needed some stripes to liven things up!

These are actually paint tape stripes.

They were helping me make the decision.

I sealed the paint tape to the desk with white.

And hellllo stripes!

Now here's where this "How-To" takes a wrong turn.

I decided that this desk needed a coat (or 3) of Shellac

so it had a super, durable finish.

I had NOOOOO idea that Shellac would make the bright white

YELLOW!!

Not a good yellowing. More like a smoker-house table yellowing.

(no pictures were taken of smoker yellow table)

Yes, I did proceed to stomp and pout.

And read the back of the can.....

"finish will have a slight golden tint".

My. Bad.

This was not Shellac launching an attack on my table.

It was a complete oversight on my part.

Ooops.

But after a few days of being irritated.

I backtracked a bit with some Ebony glaze.

And I honestly can say, I like it better now!

The glaze added a lot of depth that the previous

white, black, blue did not have.

You can acgtually see the blue outline in this picture too!

So just in time for EIU sports to get kicked off,

this table goes home!

(hopefully to a cheering, EIU fan!)

Linking Up Here!

Chic on a Shoestring, Classy Clutter,

Twigg Studios, My Repurposed Life

A dresser for Jessica

2012-08-24T10:54:00.002-07:00

Shortly after I found this

4 Drawer all Wood Dresser

One of my t-Town bff's called and wanted it.

She had been looking for a "something" for her foyer

Since she moved in, years ago.

After some measuring and design discussion

we agreed the 4 drawer dresser would work, perfectly.

And I was excited to create something for her!!

I've been having a small crush on

painted furniture with wood tops and drawers.

Soooo we decided to keep the green color

and stain the top and drawer fronts.

Unfortunately, the green on it was a wreck,

which really didn't break my heart!

To get a stained top and drawer fronts,

I decided to put the Citristrip to work!

This stuff is just fabulous!

It did take a couple of coats in some places.

(It ~~could be~~ is definitely related to my lack of patience)

I used a plastic scraper to remove the gunk,

so I didn't scratch the wood.

Then I sanded the sides.

Mixed another batch of DIY Chalk Paint

and painted the dresser.

Anddddd... I hated the color.

It was too dull.

Tooooo gray.

Toooooooo boring.

Not "fresh" enough.

The color was exactly NOT what I wanted.

I stared at it for a week.

I still wasn't happy.

So I painted again.

*sigh*

Below is a green "comparison" picture...

Seeeee new green is MUCH better!

(Side Note: I forgot to take "in progress" pictures of the staining. My bad.)

But as you see below, I stained the drawers (and top!)

And sketched a pattern using chalk...

Then painted, distressed and glazed to get this...

(Side Note: I was totally inspired by Miss Mustard Seed's "typewriter" post
in regards to the vine-y swirl-y design.
Did you see it? If not check out the link above!)

After closer inspection when I removed the tape I found

FEATHERING!!!

Ya know, paint bleed thru.

I was FRUSTRATED!!!!

I kicked myself for not using Frog Tape.

Stomped around a bit talking to myself.

And had the "Ah- HAH" moment.

I scraped the edges a bit.

And painted them the "decoration" color.

Finally, I was getting somewhere!

I went thru the "which pull" process...

And lined the drawers!
I have a ~~small~~ large obsession with fabric in drawers.
Proof can be found in many places. Like here for instance.

Unfortunately, the drawer bottoms on this puppy were a mess

Warped and Hole-y!!

(That's a bad combo for a drawer bottom.)

So my super duper understanding Hubby cut me new drawer bottoms.

(I only fear one saw, the table saw!!!!)

I decided to go about lining drawers a little differently

because of the new drawer bottoms.

After cutting the fabric I decided to use wallpaper paste to glue it down.

Not sure why I had never thought of this before...

way more economical option!

Make sure you have your fabric in the right orientation.

Liberally, coat your wood with the paste.

Lay your fabric on the pasted wood.

Smoooooth out any wrinkles....

Flip the wood over.

And wrap the edges & corners!

Before: Ugly, split, warped drawer bottom.

After: Newly inserted drawer bottom!

(Color variation indicates still wet fabric. And my inpatience.)

3 Lined drawers later I had this...

Loving the feet on this dresser!

And I actually didn't put a pop of color on the drawers!

Which is one of my weaknesses....

(You can see an example of that here if you've missed it!)

The fabric in the drawers looks great too!!

Now, I get a lot of questions and comments about WHY I take pictures outside.

It's because I paint in the garage about 99% of the time.

Basically, if I cart furniture in the house,

I'm ~~probably~~ absolutely NOT going to be able to part with it!

So my new solution is a door "screen"

waaaaa laaaaa

Outside is safe.

And the light is better for Me,

the extreme novice photographer,

with a fancy camera.

But now my grass is dead.

The doors are hiding dead grass.

And my messy garage. :)

I LOVE the wood top,

the soft drawer pattern,

And the happy green!!

I'm sure hoping Jessica & her Entry will too!!

Linking up here!

Miss Mustard Seed, Simply Designing, 504 Main,

Chic on a Shoestring, My Repurposed Life,

Redoux Interiors, Lamb Around, Nifty Thrifty Things,

Classy Clutter, Funky Junk Interiors

Under the Table and Dreaming, Primitive & Proper,
Home Stories A to Z, Savvy Southern Style,
DIY by Design, Domestically Speaking,
House on the Way

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My Repusposed Life
Primitive & Proper
Classy Clutter
Domestically Speaking
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Better After

Curb-find Screen Door

2012-07-30T10:57:00.002-07:00

One afternoon, right before school was out for the summer

I met some Mom friends & their kiddos at the park for a play date.

Not long after I left I started getting calls. And texts. And emails.

Everyone was worried I might not drive by the

Amazing doors piled up on a curb for the trash.

And they were right.

I totally drove home a different way and missed them!!

BUT since they were all super persistent I ran and I do mean RAN with my daughter to the car.

And off we went as fast as possible to rescue the doors.

Holy cow no one was exaggerating!

They were amazing doors!!

And the real surprise was I had been helping a Client search

high & low for "The door" for her office.

So "The door" with all its awesome beveled glass

quickly went to its new home.

(Of course, not quick enough for the Hubby to not question

WHY

giant doors were in the garage.)

Door #2, the gigantic screen door didn't have a home.

And it started taking up space in my garage.

(Hubby not so happy about that)

I had decided when I first picked it up

that it would make the perfect Chalkboard Door.

After he moved the screen door about 15 times I decided,

maybeeee it was time to paint it and find it a home!

Not. One. Single. "In progress" photo was taken.

(My Bad!!!)

Probably because the entire process took a few hours.

Step 1: remove screen
Step 2: cut, 1/4" plywood panel to fit in door "hole"
Step 3" paint both sides of panel "chalk board'
Now for the fun part, adding color.
Exact steps of course not documented. And "fuzzy" from the heat.

I can tell you I didn't fill a single hole...

Or remove any "spare" hardware

I layered on watered down black over the original white paint first.

And then two shades of teal blue from the clearance paint at Lowe's.

It's a double sided chalk board, so I painted both sides of everything.

If it wasn't 85" tall and I didn't have a chalkboard pantry door....

it would be in my house!!

Because I LOVE how cute it is!!!

Who would throw that thing away??

PS Yes, I do drive by the same "spot" to look for more trash doors regularly!

Linking up Here!

Primitive & Proper, Domestically Speaking

One Ginormous Hutch

2012-07-24T07:08:00.001-07:00

I recently had a small problem at an auction.

My bidding hand seemed to develop a mind of its own.

It went completely out of control and it purchased this.....

That wasn't the end of the problems....

Loading it into the truck was like a Festivus "Feats of Strength" contest!

Once my extremely understanding hubby and I got it home

and unloaded and "assembled"...

I realized this puppy was GINORMOUS!

It's 7'-8" TALL and 6'-0" long.

This hutch is definitely a statement piece.

So I posted it on my "Homeless Furniture', page

and waited.

I was hoping someone out there had the perfect spot for it.

Because I sure didn't!!

And honestly, the garage/workshop is just not doing it much justice!!

Last week my mom arrived from Florida,

and we decided the farm fresh Ginormous Hutch was ready for a makeover.

I started by painting edges on the hutch black.

In retrospect, I wish I would have painted more black.

(I ended up just layering a little more black on later in the project.)

Then I went out on a painting limb (for me).

I jumped on the DIY plaster of paris (chalk paint) bandwagon.
(link to the "recipe" I tried)

I admit, this is the first time I have used chalk paint of any kind.

Curiousity was killin me!!

The first coat had me and my mom a littttle nervous.

It was SO thin!

I liked that it was letting the black show thru.

But at the same time I didn't.

The "chalky" finish also had me a little perplexed.

But once you start painting you just have to go with it....

So instead of reachiong for the paint stripper,

I hung in there and put another coat on.

Second coat was a major improvement.

Then I added a little glaze over the top

And I distressed it just a bit

And then decided to add some more black!

Ahhhhh much better!!!

I finished it with some wipe on poly.

That really deepened the color and got rid of the chalky finish.

I know most of y'all use wax on your chalk paint.....

I didn't have any - so poly it was!

I scored some cool knobs half off at Hobby Lobby to finish it off!

Then waited for my ever patient and understanding hubby to come home.

SO we could assemble that thing!!

Even outside it looked GINORMOUS!!!

The amount of stuff you can put in and on this thing is CRAZY!

And boy did I have fun filling it!

It took many, many trips inside raiding the house to find the right collection.

I threw in yellow dishes.

And yellow and purple faux greenery.

I love purple & red together!

And I love yellow & red together!

So to me, this totally worked!

I love that there's actually enough room to serve along the front ledge.

I was dying to fill the drawers with something, but I restrained myself.

I love the way the "legs" turned out.

And all the worn edges!

And how my "stuff" looks on it!!

Just to demonstrate scale,

I actually let my hubby take a picture...

with me in it.

See, I'm really not exaggerating GINORMOUS!!!

I'm 5'-8" peeps!!

All in all, I'm thrilled with the DIY plaster of paris AKA chalk paint.

And I've made 2 more batches since then!

Linking Up Here!

Primitive & Proper, Creating a House of Grace,

Tip Junkie, Home Stories A to Z, DIY by Design, Savvy Southern Style,

Domestically Speaking, Sew Much Ado, Miss Mustard Seed,

Chic on a Shoestring Decorating, Creating a House of Grace

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Domestically Speaking

Better After

A "Man-tour-age" of Manly Projects

2012-06-28T11:22:00.001-07:00

Most of the painting I do is for women. Or requested by women for little men.

Rarely do I have the assignment of painting something "masculine".

Today I realized I have a trifecta of "Manly" projects that I haven't blogged about.....

This is me checking off my "to blog about" list...

The first paint project I bring you was actually a Christmas present...

no not a "Christmas in July" project... an actual 25th of December Christmas project.

A good friend of mine Mrs S was on the hunt for a wardrobe for her hubs.

He likes modern, clean lined funky design.
And he has a habit of discarding garments where they don't belong.
She was hoping to inspire him to keep himself organized,
by giving him a cool place to store them all his own!

So I started hunting all the usual spots &
Craigslist paid off really quickly with a set of Waterfall furniture.
(You might remember Victoria's Vanity which was also part of the set.)

This "Man-oire" as we soon dubbed it was pretty stinkin' awesome.

It was cedar lined, two tone veneer, almost all of its original hardware,

but of course it was missing a foot.

(Because feet seem to fall off of furniture a lot!)

My plan for the Man-oire was to paint a Danish flag on the front.
(Mr. S is short for a very Danish "S" name)

To challenge myself I wanted to paint everything Red

AND then leave the awesome book page veener on the front untouched.
(That veneer ws really pretty and almost sad to paint)

I assumed that I could repair the missing and loose veneer enough to make it happen.

And I could not.
**sigh**

Plan B was to go ahead and paint it out completely.

And make it super-duper high contrast.
No glaze, no distressing, ultra-shiny.

I attached the new foot and started priming.

Then came the paint. 5 coats of red later.

Yes, FIVE coats of red later.

It looked awesome.

Coat 1, 2, and 3 made me NERVOUS because it was pink-ish.
(Nervous = no photographs of pink-ish)

Pink-ish, even in the hot pink-ish spectrum is NOT MANLY!!

Giant sigh of relief when it ended up being Manly, stop sign RED!

(like the Danish flag)

I painted all the orginal wood pulls and metal do-dads out to match their "zone" of the armoire.

I was relieved that I save ALL hardware and so I had 2 pulls from Victoria's Vanity
(And I could find them!)
so I had enough originals for the Man-oire.

(AND I could get rid of the weird aluminum circle pulls!)

The finished product was a real show stopper!

Notice the big door pull?

The original amber colored plastic piece was totally out of scale.

A trip to the Lowe's plumbing section gave me a perfectly scaled, copper pipe pull.

I love how the waterfall edge shines.....

And how the "flag" wraps...

Merry Christmas to Mr. S - your very own Man-oire! ;)

The Second and Third paint projects in the Manly Tri-fecta are almost the same.... but their not!

My husband just finished his BS (SO proud of him!).

Something he never thought he would do when he joined the Army... actually use his GI Bill!!

Hubs said I couldn't buy him a present.

SO I didn't spend a penny on this curb find!

Hubs is a HUGE St Louis Cardinals fan.

HUGE.

I wanted to paint something that looked like

a cool, worn sign for his Man Cave as a graduation present.

But first I had to repair the cracked top and do some light sanding.... cause it was peel-y.

(See my cool new "new to me" clamps from my Paw-Paw? Thanks Paw-Paw!)

Then I added some stain to even out the top color....

And started drawing circles with my kids chalk.

Thanks Kids! ;)

I used the chalk lines as the guide to paint my bands.

Then I added a logo. Also sketched in chalk first.

Then some red and some more white circles...

And did a little light sanding..

After that I swore the children to secrecy.

And hid the table in the garage!

(Hiding things in my garage is really easy. It's always FULL of projects and kids and toys!)

I had told one of my client's Mrs. O about the table.

She wanted one too.

So along came Cards fan table #2!

But her table didn't come from a curb. Instead a garage sale!

Mrs. O's table started with a black top and the chalk lines showed up great!

But the painting process was basically the same!

This time however, I painted the center red and put the logo on TOP!

Painting around the logo on my Hubs table took quite a bit longer!!

When Mrs. O's Man Cave table left tho it was basically the same....

Shew. That's a lot of Manly painting.

I may need to paint something pink!!

Linking Up Here!

Domestically Speaking, Primitive & Proper, Sew Much Ado,

Miss Mustard Seed, Chic on a Shoestring Decorating, My Repurposed Life,

Redoux , Simply Designing, Tip Junkie

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Better After

Not so Shabby Buffet & Bookcase

2012-06-18T13:54:00.000-07:00

Any other Moms out there struggling to balance their to-do lists

now that the kiddos are on summer vaca??

Or am I alone in this one??

I tried and tried to finish these 2 lovelies BEFORE the kids had

complete control over the house....

but of course Life Interrupted as usual and it didn't happen.

I'm happy to report they are home with their owner finally.

Here's a peak at the process!

Mrs's R's Buffet was totally fabulous... and needed a little love.

Missing & loose veneer was everywhere.

And it's poor feet were in need of a furniture pedi in a BAD way!

How you ask, do you fix gigantic chunks of missing feet??

CREATIVELY!!

I tried to get a ball made but unfortunately

that wasn't going to happen with the way these feet are made...

I needed to remove a foot to give them a "pattern" foot

to attempt to re-create.

Totally to risky for a buffet that wasn't mine!!

So I bought 2 wood balls,

had my husband risk HIS fingers slicing them up with a miter saw

AND glued those little chunks on!!

Then I started gluing and patching.

And sanding.

And more patching...

And more sanding....

I avoided what was left of the label on the inside of the drawer....

Still not sure what it said!

After what seemed like an eternity of veneer gluing I primed.

I actually "spray primed" this time.... I didn't want to layer up the awesome details!

**Helpful Tip**

Notice that I literally have this piece "On Blocks".

So. Much. Easier.

When furniture is off the floor!

That's Back Saving advice peeps!!

Then I painted the insides of the cabinets a pretty "wine" red.

I have to admit it looked so perfectly creamy white that I hesitated

for a bit before I started distressing.

But WOW sanding and glazing made it shine with Awesome-ness!!

All those awesome grooves in the legs loved the glaze!

All the original pulls cleaned and put back on!!

Love the red with the creamy white!

The bookcase that came along with the buffet from Mrs. R was a family heirloom...

That neeeeded a makeover!

Since it was Mr. R's Grandpa's bookcase,

I didn't want to completely girly it up!

Or make it unrecognizable to Mr. R!

SO I decided to wash it with some black.

And add a Manly "R" Monogram on each side.

**Sidenote**
Where, you ask, did I get the stencil?

I made it.

With "Word". And printer paper. And my trusty exacto.

And I painted very, very gently.... and didn't have any bleed thru. The end.

The monograms were so nice it needed more.

(I thought.)

What's more manly than pinstripes??

And a few numbers, just in case he needs to direct Mrs. R to a shelf! ;)

I gilded the monograms & pinstripes & numbers just a little.

And called this Buffet & Bookcase adventure DONE!

Well all except for the delivering!

This is one of my FAVORITE views out the back of a truck window....

Freshly Painted Furniture going HOME!

PS Check out my new tab (at the top): "Homeless Furniture".

I need to purge some of my growing "to-do's"!!!

Linking Up!

Home Stories A to Z, Creating A House of Grace, Tip Junkie,

Redoux Interiors, 504 Main, Embracing Change, Twigg Studios,

Primitive & Proper, A Bowl Full of Lemons, DIY by Design,

Domestically Speaking, Sisters of the Wild West, Miss Mustard Seed,

Simply Designing, My Repurposed Life, Chic on a Shoestring

Fun with Power Tools.....

2012-04-12T07:41:00.002-07:00

I'm sure everyone wonders where I disappear to between blogs...

No, it's not into a furniture coma.

No, I'm definitely not hibernating.

Or eating bon bons.

Currently - I'm juggling many projects for clients. AND many projects around MY house!

This is a taste of how crazy MY house projects get.

So I finally Purchased Pantry Cabinets (YEA!!!!)

I've been dreaming, scheming, envisioning having these puppies for a year. Maybe 2.

So when my husband gave me the green light to get them, I did.

The next day we primed them. Two days later I painted them.

A week or so later we carried them in.

And he hated them. And I wasn't sure I liked them either. :(

SO my fabulous dream pantry cabinets became a major PROBLEM!!!

I wanted and needed more kitchen storage.

BUT I didn't love how massive the off the shelf, big box store, stock cabinets were.

**SIGH**

SO I consulted with the BFF via many panic-y texts.

With pictures from every angle of the kitchen of course!

And told her my new slightly INSANE plan to make them better.

And after she told me it wasn't THAT insane an idea I broke out every power saw I owned.

And started calling local friends for HELP!!!

Help arrived a couple hours later and she was calm, supportive and strong.

Which is the best kind of help!

More help came a little bit after that toting her hubby's reciprocating saw - YEA!!!

(sidenote: I NEEEEEED a reciprocating saw!!).

SO in the MIDDLE of my kitchen. (I did protect the floors mind you). Miss C and I flipped the cabinets over on sawhorses, I fired up my circular saw and I sawed the pantry cabinets in half.

Vertically in half.

So now instead of being 24" deep, they are now 12" deep.

(Live action sawing picture provided by my helpers!)

I am THRILLED with the results!

Now they are PERFECT!

They are the same depth as the over head cabinets.

Of course I still have to :

Cut & install backs for them, drill holes for the shelf supports,

anchor them to the wall and install the doors..... but they are on their way to PERFECT!

BTW did anyone notice the counter tops???

New counters are being installed today!!

BUH-bye BLUE counter tops!! Hellooooo looks like granite laminate!

Can't wait to share pictures of a finished kitchen!

Here's a tip for anyone who gets a wild hair to saw something painted in half today...

make sure you tape where you are going to cut!!

Now I'm taking votes - should I knock out the scroll-y dated board over the sink???

I'm off to figure out where to put the other "half" of my pantry cabinets!

Total surprise bonus of the week - by "modifying" them I got 2 for the price of 1!!

Linking up!

DIY by Design, Embracing Change

Not JUST a Housewife

WINNER!

Westlakes "Project of the Month" Prize Winner!

Redono Re-do

2012-02-28T17:40:00.000-08:00

(Featured at Tip Junkie)

I blinked and it was February. Did that happen to anyone else?

January seriously flew by. I’ve been working on fun stuff left & right!!

This lovely little dresser, another Craigslist find (of course)

I picked up the first week of January.

I had been hunting high and low for months for something JUST like it to paint for the school “Redono” auction! I was beyond excited when I found it.

It had great character. It had nice lines. It was the perfect size for lots of uses – dresser, buffet, foyer statement piece….. Of course it needed some love.

The top was in about 4 pieces and it was allll wonky! Wonky in this case is defined as needing a wall to lean on or it quite possibly would fall down. True story.

A few new corner blocks inside and a lotta glue and it was back upright and ready for paint!

Right after finding the dresser on Craigslist I started fabric shopping.

I picked up this fabric by Braemore on sale! Score!!

image VIA Online Fabric Store

After the typical prep work came my FAVORITE part. Sketching designs!!

I like to sketch a little on paper. Then make a practice board to see how the sketch translates when it’s in color.

Then in this case I cut out the flowers I sketched and laid them out in different combinations on the dresser til I couldn’t think about it anymore….

Then I started painting!

After it was primed I decided the drawers needed more wood fill. Which means more sanding. And more priming. But eventually I got to the base coat.

Because of all the layers of paint there was a lot of waiting for paint to dry….

Obviously you can’t paint a color on top of another color til the bottom color is dry.

Slows everything down which is nice if you have things to do in between painting.

BAD if you are in a hurry!! But GOOD if you like to text friends non-stop while painting.

The flowers imitate the fabric. Sorta. I had done some sketches before I even found a dresser or fabric and came up with a flower I wanted to use. So I did. Even though technically it’s nowhere on the fabric!

I painted the drawer sides with a coordinating blue.

Sidenote: for the first time EVER I used ALLLLL matching Pulls! WHOA! How about that!

Slapped a glaze on it.

And called it done. 4 days after I started. 24 hours before the auction.

Just call me Queen of Procrastination.

Someday my tendency to procrastinate will most likely end badly.

But boy O boy I hope I’m wrong!

Vivacious Victoria's Vanity

2011-12-11T19:08:00.000-08:00

I was super excited to be commissioned to find and create a vanity for
my beautiful niece Victoria’s Christmas present.
She is every bit the definition of Vivacious – a lively spirit thru and thru!

After I found the perfect medium on Craigslist (of course!)
at an unbelievably reasonable price,
I had to figure out how to capture a little bit of
Victoria's spunk in a piece of furniture.

Miss V is quite the glamorous girly girl.
Her bedroom at home is a combination of several, super bright colors.

But for her vanity, I wanted something that would grow with her
and hopefully last thru a few different bedroom personalities!
Something neutral, and METALLIC!!

The first step however was to get a new foot made to imitate the other three.

A round, turned foot. With little grooves up and down it.

Simple to make right?? NOT REALLY!

Thankfully we have some outstanding craftsmen in our area and

Mr. Eli whipped out two in a few weeks for me for next to nothing.

(No I did not mistype, there’s a reason I needed two,
I’ll share the other reason after it’s delivered!)

So I began Miss V’s vanity with the usual TLC
old furniture such as this requires:

patching missing veneer, regluing loose veneer,
repairing drawer slides, and sanding.

And sanding. And sanding.

I do have to admit that the sanding this time was completely enjoyable for the first time EVER!

I recently bought myself a new fancy orbital sander and it is amazing!!

See, can you see how nice it sanded??

Then I installed the perfectly made new foot and did a giant sigh of relief.
The "shoe" fit! :)

Relief lasted for about 30 seconds.

Then I calculated that I had exactly two days to finish the thing.

I was instantly un-relieved!!

All primed out Miss V’s vanity looked like an entirely new piece of furniture.

The white covered up all the “life lessons” the furniture
had experienced and what I was left with was so exciting!

The waterfall edges were totally gorgeous!!

Next I fell in love with it again when it was a super great shade of gray.

But the fun hadn’t even started yet!!

I opened the can of “Razzle Dazzle” and had to giggle.
My plans included painting the insides and outsides of the drawers hot pink.
It took four coats of pink but finally they were PINKALICIOUS!

Which was exactly what I had in mind for my "Pink-A-Boo" drawers.
Totally inspired by my 2 year olds favorite book "Pinkalicious".
And lack of sleep.

I love seeing the drawer left slightly open against the pretty metallic finish!!

Work was nowhere near complete...
when I suddenly realized I had forgotten the gorgeous,
giant round mirror WITH A WOOD BASE completely!!!
FACEPALM moment!!

After a mad dash to the garage to retrieve it I started wood prep, again.

And went to bed a little concerned with my schedule.

Thursday I only had about 7 hours I could spend on the vanity

(2 at nap, 1 maybeeee after dinner, and 4 after kiddos bedtime).

In that time I somehow managed to put final coats of the gray on.
And get the mirror caught up to the rest of the vanity.

AND start making that vanity shine, literally!

Many coats of silver metallic had me wondering if I had hit shine overload.

Friday morning after having a brief “it might be too shiny discussion”
with the BFF we decided I should
live on the edge and knock the beautiful shine down a bit.

After a little mixing I closed my eyes...
and layered on some black metallic glaze.

I was instantly smitten. Suddenly things were allll gooooood.

I hand painted a “V” monogram in the center part.
And started applying the finish.

When the finish coats were finished I was tickled pink! ;)
(Reading "Pinkalicious" may help some of this post make sense)

But of course I wasn’t done……

First, my father-in-law had to cut down the beautiful pinkalicious pulls,

because they were almost a mile toooo long.

Then the Hubby helped install the pulls,

because my nerves were totally shot!!
And I admit, I was scared to drill into the metallic shine!

I zebra lined the drawers with some fabric……because Miss V loves zebra!

And went to bed. STILL NOT DONE!! (this was a recurring theme!)

The next morning I had to figure out how to:
fix/replace/FIND two missing roller feet!
Nothing like cutting it to the wire.
*Sigh*
T minus 3 hours til Miss Victoria's arrival and counting.

Long story short I figured out that I needed new rollers,
raided the father-in-laws handy-dandy wheel stash,
threw a shiny bow on the vanity and decided to wrap up business....
AFTER letting Miss V see the final vanity BUT before she left town. :)

Miss Victoria’s Vanity is every bit of fabulous.
Pictures were challenging (for me) with all that shine….

The Pink-A-Boo drawers are a perfect surprise.

The Zebra lined drawers are a wild bit of whimsy.

The Pinkalicious Pulls shine like jewels.

And the monogram “V” claims it as Miss Victoria’s for a long time.

This Vivacious Vanity will hopefully be something she can love at least through the rest of her teens.

I’m of course missing the vanity’s coolness!

And prepping for another paint project that I need to start in…..
Ooooo…. 16 hours.

P.S. Yes, she is in love with it!

Preston's Woodsy Nursery

2011-08-02T06:30:00.000-07:00

(Featured at Apartment Therapy & Tip Junkie)

So I must have taken a little beginning of summer siesta….. and woke up at the END of summer!! Sorry. I promise I have been busy. I took a break from furniture painting (my garage was about 140 degrees) and spent the summer with the kiddos at the pool. I’m now very tan and trying to get back into the swing of everything and hoping to start showing off some of the stuff I did over the summer very soon.

I'll start with my most recent project, by recent I mean I completed it 2 days ago. The Woodsy Nursery Furniture for my soon-to-be-born, newest nephew Preston…. He’s due to arrive around the first of November. And his parents have picked out the cutest woodsy, owl themed bedding.

image via skip hop

Now, I was planning on doing just this plain old white changing table.

But sitting in the garage I also had this plain old white matching 4 drawer chest....

My parents were visiting and planning on hauling the changing table to my brother in 5 days. They had plenty of room in their giant RV for the chest too. That meant Preston needed two pieces of furniture and so began my 5 day painting marathon.

After filling holes, doing minor repairs and lightly sanding everything down. I painted both pieces a really nice, neutral, stone color that matched the bedding.

Then I sketched some tall trees that wrapped around and over all the nooks and crannies of the furniture. (you'll have to look very closely... pencil didn't show up very well!)

And painted the trees a soft oatmeal color.

After the trees were complete I added leaves. LOTS of leaves. In 4 colors and 2 patterns just to make it more challenging because my FIVE DAY deadline for completion wasn’t nearly overwhelming enough.

Of course, no tree is complete without some sort of flying bird, right? My trees were no different. I perched an Owl on each tree. One on the side of the changing table and the other on the front of the chest so little Preston didn’t grow up feeling like he was being stared at constantly by Owls!

After 4 days and 20+ hours of painting all that woodsy-goodness I did something that almost caused my Mother instant heart failure. I pulled out my trusty fine tipped sharpie and added a little visual interest. Think of it as contrast stitching…. I outlined leaves and owls and trees.

Then to make it just a little more heart wrenching for my mom, I added a little stippling. My Mom thought the heat must have gone to my head, and people it was getting HOT in the garage. After several comments about “adding work for yourself” I think she got it! Which was good, because once I started it’s not like I could really go back. :)

On the evening of the fourth day, my Mom made dinner and I glazed furniture.

I woke in a panic on the fifth day hoping the glaze had dried enough for the finish coats and hardware. Because my parents were scheduled to load it up and haul the freshly painted furniture to my brother in Minneapolis that very day!!!! Seriously THAT very same afternoon.

Somehow I finished. The finish coats dried. The insanely cute, perfectly rustic, twiggy hardware was on. The pictures were taken. And the giant RV was loaded. I informed my dad that once it left my zip code it was no longer under warranty… so drive carefully!! And raced to get my new kindergartener from school all the while wondering how long it would be before I got to see the woodsy furniture again…. and wondering what in the world Preston's parents were going to think of the furniture they knew nothing about!

How cute are they sitting together?!?!

After 32 hours of painting in 5 days I’m now totally exhausted. But it was totally worth it!!

Linking up at: Design Dazzle, Chic on a Shoestring, Miss Mustard Seed, My Repurposed Life, The Shabby Nest, Creations by Kara, Whipper Berry, Tatertots and Jello, 504 Main, On Sutton Place, Thrifty Decorating, Remodelaholic, Altar'd, Be Different Act Normal, Sisters of the Wild West, Under the Table and Dreaming, nifty thrifty things, the diy showoff, Flamingo Toes, I heart nap time, The Girl Creative, it's so very cheri, Tip Junkie, Sweet Little Gals, Home Stories A to Z, Primitive & Proper, Not Just a Housewife, The Lettered Cottage, Sew Much Ado, The Southern Institute

Hello May!

2011-05-06T12:52:00.000-07:00

WOW! It’s already Friday!

I’m gearing up for Couples Golf tonight and me and my hubs are SO excited!!

We haven’t golfed since last summer and of course an evening sans child sounds amazing.

Now, yes we did have an evening last weekend without the small ones but who’s counting? ;)

As usual, my week has been hectic!

But there was variety to the crazy-ness so that makes it fun.

To recap my week, I took some senior pictures (no I'm not a photographer).

I took some First Communion pictures & family pictures.

Again, I'm not a photographer, but I am a cheap hire.

I’m still working on this.

But the little people seem to interrupt a lot! ;)

Plus it's been COLD and RAINY and I decided I needed to fill the drawers AGAIN.

So progress has been slow....

I’ve rid my house of my cute bunny bunting inspired by Jenn at Clean & Scentsible,

You can read about it here

I hung them on the doorways to the little peoples rooms and in the kitchen across the french doors.

They were a hit with the little people!

I redistributed my toilet paper roll "flowers" around the house.

Some landed in these sunflower “centerpieces” I threw together for spring.

I’m still loving them. Especially with the added purple "flowers".

So for now they are staying as we move from "spring" decorating into “summer”!

They were easy to do,

I wrapped and tied twine around a glass vase that was filled with nuts (leftover from winter).

I stuck a fake flower “bouquet” inside (nuts are basically hidden but anchor "bouquet".

And ta-daaaa! A centerpiece. Quick, easy, totally painless decorating!

Since the husband is making me brunch on Sunday,

I did some prep work today for Mother’s Day to make things easier for him.

His mom and step dad are joining us for Brunch Sunday,

so I thought a little help would be appreciated.

I got to plan the menu so we’re having

my Blue Cheese & Bacon quiche and French Bread French Toast. YUMMY!!

Yesterday I scored some day old bread from Wally World. So I sliced it up.

And bagged it for the freezer! In case anyone out there didn’t know – bread freezes amazingly!! (At thanksgiving I stock up on herbed focaccia breads to use for my stuffing!)

This will make it easy for the other half to whip up some of this for me Sunday!

And today I’m baking the bacon for the quiche. O ya you heard me correctly.

An awesome tip from Rachel Ray – bake the bacon!

About 25 minutes at 425.

Kitchen will smell like bacon but only the oven will have grease splatters!

Of course I couldn’t wait to start on a couple other pieces.

I scored this cheap-o shelf at Goodwill for my kitchen.

And this lovely item from my in-laws trash pile.

Seriously from the trash.

I know, can you believe they were throwing it away?

I have a lot of ideas for it….. but I haven’t narrowed down what it should be yet!

I’ve been giving it a lot of thought tho, in my free time, when I’m watching paint dry!!

Can't wait to show you what this is turning into!! Any guesses?? ;)

Two Hands Are Better Than One

2011-04-28T16:31:00.000-07:00

I’m trying to make a commitment to posting once a week. My goal was to blog about a project I completed the previous week. I knew that was going to be a challenge because honestly I don’t know if I can complete a project every week – but I love to try! This would be the week where I did a lot but didn’t paint anything! Or create anything for myself, which is cool because it’s more fulfilling to do things for others anyway.

The key to success (in my opinion) when you are a SAHM such as myself is having awesome friends around who lend a hand. Sometimes you lend the hand, sometimes they lend you one. But weekly there are opportunities to lend and receive!

So this week I focused on catching up on household chores that had been put aside during our 2 week stomach virus. And helping a friend. And I ended up being helped by a friend!

It’s First Communion Season in our parts so a top priority this week was to make a veil for G, a daughter of a SAHM Miss N. No, I am not in the veil making business and No I have never made a veil. I am, a complete cheap skate and can’t stand to pay ridiculous amounts of money for small pieces of tulle. (My MIL actually made my veil and I glued rhinestones on it the morning of my wedding) Since I also don’t like my friends to pay for over priced tulle I decided I should try veil construction myself. Here is my pile of very expensive veil making supplies

That's about $6 worth of stuff! Totally high dollar!! ;)

I don’t actually own a serger so I headed to my MIL’s and had her serge the seams of a rectangle of tulle, came home and folded it like this.

Then I ran a long-ish running stitch down the fold and gathered. I'm sure this is done typically with a sewing maching. I wasn't in the mood to argue with my sewing machine so I did it by hand. For some reason I can sew pretty much anything by hand!

I had discussed with G’s mom options for the veil – headband or comb? Flowers or plain? So I had one of G’s headbands to play with. I wrapped it in ribbon and sewed and heat sealed the ends to secure it to the head band. Yes, I sewed the ends because I didn’t want globs of glue that might rub behind her ears.

I had a brief “meeting” with G and her momma and we decided to pitch the headband, go with the comb, and add a few silk flowers. End result:

Total cost of this First Communion veil: $2 for the silk flowers my MIL already had the tulle leftover from wedding decorations). The ribbon was an additional $2 on sale. But since we didn’t use the ribbon wrapped headband I don’t know if we should apply that $2 to the veil cost?? Even if we did the veil would still only cost a whopping $4. The cheapest veil kit at Michaels was $9.99 and you didn’t get flowers! And most First Communion Veils start at $35!!! $35 vs. $2…… I think the hour I spent was worth it! I saved my friend from spending quite a bit of cash!

What do you think?

This week on my to do list was making laundry soap - just another way I try to stick to my budget! Yes, I initially thought this was CRAZY talk. But after using 10 gallons of laundry soap that only cost me $7 for supplies (and having enough supplies for minimum of 20 additional gallons for no additional money!) I’ve decided that I will never BUY laundry soap again!! On my to do list this week was making more laundry soap…. This is the recipe I use that another SAHM, Miss CJP gave me.

Laundry Detergent Concentrate

INGREDIENTS:

Borax

Washing Soda

Ivory Soap (bar)

5gal bucket

1. Grate one bar of Ivory soap

2. Combine grated soap & 4c. hot tap water in a sauce pan

3. Cook over med/low heat until soap melts

4. Fill 5gal bucket ½ full (2.5gal) with hot tap water

5. Add soap mixture, 1c. Washing Soda, ½ c. Borax to bucket & stir until dissolved

6. Fill bucket with hot tap water (2.5gal) & stir

7. Cover & allow to sit overnight

NOTE: THIS IS CONCENTRATE!

• Dispense concentrate into an old detergent container until ½ full, fill remainder of container with hot tap water

• Shake and repeat before each use

• Top Loading Machines- ½ c.

• Front Loading Machines-1/3 c.

• HE Machines-1/3c.

CJP also lended me a hand by gifting me 5 gallons of laundry soap she had made from a new recipe. SWEEEEET! Not that making laundry soap is difficult AT ALL but not having to make it is a giant bonus!!! Thank you CJP for knocking an item off my to-do list!

Here’s the low down on homemade laundry soap – you don’t want it too sudsy for HE machines. Too many suds burns up the motor on those fancy beasts. CJP was worried that the new recipe and her month old HE machines weren’t going to jive so she gifted over the yellow gel-ish mixture to me. Maybe today I should in turn mix her up some of our Original Recipe soap?!?

Final opportunity to help N popped up unexpectedly when we were reviewing veil options and hair styles for G. Last week I was completely inspired by these super cute butterfly chocolates I saw here Did you guys see them too?? Go now! Her pics are way better than my phone pics! Not to mention her butterflies look perfect-o!

Which meant for Easter at the In-law’s I had to make some!! The Butterflies were so easy and so cute that I made Bunnies and Bunny Ears! And of course a couple monograms for the kids….

After telling N about my fun with chocolate I volunteered to make some cuteness for G’s birthday cupcakes because I was having way too much fun with candy melt!!

After a little thought I decided to throw in an offer no SAHM mom could possibly refuse when they are crazy busy – I would also bake the cupcakes and she could pick up “naked” cupcakes to ice and decorate! My goal was also to save her from a little work while she got her house ready for weekend guests coming to celebrate First Communion and honestly I just like to bake.

Ready for pick up!

How cute did they turn out??

The weeks almost over and I don't have any helpful things to do for my friends at the moment and we’re finally heading outside to play because I see SUNSHINE!! I thought we might have gotten blown west to Seattle – I swear rain and clouds have been hanging around for a month straight! I'm so sick of rain that I honestly don't care if I see any "May Flowers"!

Nice weather is also going to hopefully let me make some progress on this diamond in the rough! Check back soon to see if I get paint slapped on it!

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Baby Girl's Room: A Spring Clean & A Tour

2011-04-21T06:05:00.000-07:00

We've reached a turning point around our house, at least I'm hoping we have. It's potty training season and things haven't been going so smoothly! A bout with the stomach flu last week pretty much did us in but I'm trying to rebound this week. Part of the rebound was a little reorganizing and (My FAVORITE) furniture scooting.

Please don't judge the first picture, Baby Girl's room was a complete TuTu, doll house mess.

I was actually at a loss as to how to organize this mess. I went in her room with the plan of clearing out clothes for a garage sale and to possibly get rid of the diaper supplies......

So after a general clean out I had a small disaster in my room!

Then to organize.... I shuffled items a few times actually before I decided that the bottom drawer of the changing table would make a good spot for storing dress up items if it was divided.

Since I had literally an hour before I had to pick up Big Brother from Kindegarten Round-up there really wasn't much time for ANYTHING! This is my temporary drawer divider solution. To either someday be reinforced, made prettier, or completely pitched for something better.

Hello cardboard..... it's been awhile. Missed ya!

So I sliced up a box and after ~~careful measuring~~ no use of real measuring tools I folded it into "U" shapes to later be secured, somehow to the drawer itself. Then sorted dress up supplies into 3 categories, shoes, tutu's and bling/ accessories. This seems to actually work really well. We will see how long it takes my dainty 2 year old destructor to dismantle it!

So after a little furniture shuffling and a quick vac her room is looking back to normal!

Would you like a peak at the rest of the room?

I'm still loving the furniture my mom and I painted for her while I was preggo.

This still holds baby blankets but I've been planning on installing a hinge to prevent finger squishing when the time was right so it could be used as a toy box. I think the time is right!!

The dress Baby Girl wore to my sisters wedding just happened to match perfectly.... it's been hanging on display waiting for another fancy occasion for over a year. Hmmmmm that means it's probably too small now huh??

So do you like the furniture? Wondering what it looked like before?? OK.... I can show you that too!

O yea.... it's the basic girls gold and white french provincial and actually it was all mine! I loved being able to re-create my little girl furniture for her! After a light sand, we applied a turquoise glaze and then antiqued to tone down the turquoise. Finished with a spray poly.

So, did you even notice the "flaw" on the tall dresser? Look closely....

I don't think anyone besides my mom and myself has ever even noticed!

So a small Design Summary for anyone who is interested:

Walls are a large horizontal stripe (18" to be exact) of Sherwin Williams Solaria and white.
CB2 styrofoam flower wall art is "sprinkled" around the room.
Bedding: Customized Wendy Bellissimo (it's a long story). I deconstructed the B-R-Us pink, black & white set and added my own yellow ticking and hand sewed on the turquoise satin trim. It was a process. I was full-on nesting like crazy is my only excuse!
Curtain panels: Walmart, I added the black pom pom trim.
Furniture: my vintage french provincial circa 1978 by Bassett
Hanging lamp: vintage 1973 from who knows where! (first thing my parents bought themselves after they were married..... interesting purchase, huh??)
Americana Boy & Girl pictures, Vintage from my great-aunt. I actually slept in her guest room where they hung at her house!
Coat rack, Vintage from my Paw-Paw, I think from a Masonic lodge that closed?

Girls rooms, aren't they just the most fun?!?

Spring Fever is here! We’re cleaning, organizing, painting and staining EVERYWHERE!

2011-04-14T13:17:00.000-07:00

Our house is currently being attacked from all sides and I couldn’t be happier about it! My husband and I have the spring fever itch to clean and organize. It all started with a major Craigslist score of some insanely cheap and even delivered used cabinets. Now this put a complete halt to my ability to paint any furniture which yes is a bummer since there are 5 naked pieces lined up in the garage and at least 3 stowed away in the basement…. But I can deal because soon my workshop a.k.a. paint studio will be FABULOUS!!

(see hubby hard at work? unfortunately - hanging cabinets I can't seem to do without him!)

Since I can’t get at the furniture til the mess is organized I’ve had a chance to focus on other items that were desparately needing attention – like the deck. I think on the very last beautiful day in October we decided to power wash the deck and attempt to get it re-stained. Let’s just say Mother Nature won and our deck sat completely unprotected for the entire winter. Bad us. But at nap time this week you could find me speed staining like a super freak. I stained as fast as humanly possible!!

Poor unprotected deck!!

The expensive deck cleaner and power washing done in the fall unfortunately didn't remove all the old red cedar stain....

Our stain color test a.k.a. "what color stain did we actually buy?!?!?!"

How I began: First I hauled the ridiculously heavy 5 gallon buckets of stain up from the basement where they had been living and down into the yard for mixing.

We scored both of these last fall for about half the cost of one 5 gallon bucket (which was why we spontaneously decided we should refinish the deck, in 6 hours, on a Sunday, with rain in the forecast). They were both miss-tints and while I was not in LOVE with either of the colors at that price the bargain shopper in me really couldn’t argue about the “perfect” color with my husband.

I made a super speedy run with the kids despite them both having a stomach bug to purchase an additional 5 gallon bucket and began mixing. Half of color A into the empty bucket followed by half of color B. Then the remaining half of color A I poured back into color B’s bucket. I repeated this pouring process (with some additional stirring and shaking) until both buckets looked like the same shade of cocoa stain. Sidenote: my arms got quite the workout, 5 gallons is heavy!! I then poured a small amount into my favorite paint container, empty plastic coffee “cans”!

Mixing was MESSY. Be proud, I even wore gloves! It was so messy that there are no pictures of mixing... sorry!

After a new "sample" was painted I got to it!

I seriously stained like a nut. I didn’t know my paintbrush could move that fast. I remembered about half way thru the process that my mom recommended mopping the stain on – that might actually have been faster but I really wasn’t in the mood to stop!

Today is the last day before the nasty cold weather moves in so this morning with it being finally dry enough to walk on I lugged the furniture back up onto the deck and grabbed a couple of pictures. We are sooooo not done out here, so don’t judge the design just yet! In the near future I will update my deck with some Mary Poppins inspired umbrellas, a custom made deck box AND some flag art that I’ve been crushing on. I have a GREAT idea for a custom coffee table but I’m not even going to cross my fingers on getting that done before fall!

I know, I know. Little Tikes plastic totally lacks any design edge.... but the kids love it!

Yesterday during nap time since I couldn’t move furniture to the deck I decided it was time to finish sprucing up my porch flower pots. I have 4 total that I normally attempt to grow flowers in and they were shades of beige and gold. They had suffered a little in the move from the Okie state and were showing a little damage. Perfect canvases for paint! Right before I left town to deliver the Argyle Changing Table to my sister I had put some red on the 2 urn style but I wasn’t in love with them.

After reviewing the paint options and not finding a way to mix up a great shade of eggplant like I had in mind I went back to red, dug out some espresso, and a little beige. I had also played on the beige pots with some black so yes, I had to re-beige the beige!  But I used a better beige so it’s ok!

Then on I taped off for some stripes on the big pots....

Painted the entire large pot the espresso color & added espresso "rings" to my 2 urn style pots.

I threw a little stain on them to distress them (don't laugh - just cause they're flower pots doesn't mean you can't stain them people!) Waited for them to dry about, Oooo 5 minutes and moved them to the porch!

I like how they coordinate with the fountain just enough....

And for this week at least, the porch is complete! Cause I am almost out of nap time!! ;)

An Argyle Changing Table for Baby Gabe

2011-04-07T07:19:00.000-07:00

(Featured at Apartment Therapy, Tip Junkie & The Nate Berkus Show )
(Grand Prize Winner at Westlake Ace Hardware Customer Project of the Month)

I've been up to a lot over the past year but I haven't found time to blog about any of it! I'm regrouping though and ready to share some of my projects!! Here's the first (of hopefully many) blogs!

My sisters JUST had a baby boy. It took a long time to come up with the perfect baby gift but somehow without me really giving it much thought I came with what I feel is the perfect gift for my new nephew! I found a dresser for CHEAP that I thought would make a great changing table - nice height, nice size and nice details! My sister lives 400+ miles South West of me and I wasn't going to back for a visit til the baby was born so I decided I should just paint it for her. That's where the fun began!

Before paint - you needed quite a bit of imagination to see the potential. My husband definitely didn't see potential, except if I was planning on using it for fire wood!

But after a LOT of paint - taaaa daaaa!

Now I'm not going to pretend that this process was quick and easy. I had never painted argyle on anything. I'm not even sure where or when I decided that I should paint argyle.... but somehow the idea came to me and I had to do it. It took a lot of prep work just to be able to start painting. For instance the front of the drawers resembled a wave pool at Big Splash(White Water, etc!)!

Eeeek! Talk about a veneer mess! The craigslist photo didn't really show all the problems with this dresser.

So after patching veneer, using a ton of wood fill, re-gluing all the wavy veneer and giving the entire thing a light sand I had something that wasn't a whole lot prettier! But I was still focused on the potential, not my husbands head shaking!

Once I felt I could do nothing more to help the state of the veneer I primed, put a base coat of red on the drawer fronts and started trying to figure out how exactly to paint argyle.... there was a lot of sketching before I finally started cutting up my church bulletins into diamond shapes and using them as the pattern. Why use new paper when you can up-cycle your church bulletin?!?

I finally liked the size and location of my diamonds so I started painting.... I added 2 colors of diamonds that matched my sisters nursery fabrics. Side note: I taped the drawers together on the side after my 2 small children ran thru the kitchen and everything was bumped out of place resulting in some paint touch up!

Then it was time to try to decide what kind of accent line/dash to put on top of all those diamonds. I ran out of bulletins and yarn seemed more practical for imitating lines anyway. I would like to say I measured exactly where the lines should be painted.... but I didn't. I eyeballed it and put a couple of marks under my yarn line. Then used a ruler to draw the line I needed to paint.

After the chocolate brown line was dry I decided the drawers needed one more thing.... tiny orange diamonds at the intersections. Because I HAD to have an odd number of colors for my sanity's sake.

I had already decided that the top drawer should not have argyle, and I knew I wanted to put a monogram on it somehow but it took me cutting out the paper "G" to decide that the chocolate lines should carry over to the top drawer even thought the argyle didn't. And since my sister waited til the last SECOND to decide on a middle name the dresser only got one letter of his monogram!

You might have noticed that I was painting all these drawers in the middle of my kitchen. Not really a planned thing but it was about 17 in my garage even though it was February and I could not stand the cold! We were getting new floors anyway so I wasn't tooo concerned about floor protection! BUT I couldn't get the rest of the dresser in by myself so I had to wait a week for it to warm up so I could finish!! But I did test out how the drawers would look..... AFTER I finished building a backsplash for the dresser top.

Once the top was primed & painted I distressed the entire thing added some pulls (2 different styles of course) and then shellac'd and shellac'd and shellac'd. I've used poly in the past on furniture I've painted and never really liked the finish durability or the amount of dry time. Whole different story with shellac!! LOVE that stuff!! 4+ stars for shellac!!

And the end result was this:

After a 400 mile journey to T-town, baby Gabe's new changing table was delivered safely to his new nursery to await his arrival!!

Featured At:

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Linking up!

Entirely toooo busy!

2010-01-28T08:46:00.000-08:00

i must begin by apologizing. i've been completely slacking on this blog! but believe me it's not because i've been hangin out on the couch eating bon bons. the days have seriously flown by. so here's a recap of everything i've been accomplishing!

ps i've got about 6 drafts of blogs that just never got posted over all this stuff... i just decided i should consolidate! :)

Snow Day!

the excitement of the snow day actually got to me too! i decided we should celebrate by making some paper snowflakes....

then i hung them from the ceiling with thumbtacks and my husbands fishing line (shhhhh don't tell!) so it would look like snow if falling on him while he napped. ahhhh so peaceful, huh? it gave us happy nap times for all of 3 days.

Hair Goodies

lately i've broken all my rules and become somewhat obsessed with girl hair accessories. i swore off bows and fluffy pink stuff while i was preggo with the crawler, but man i've become a sucker for the cuteness on my baby girl! so me and the scissors have been whipping out felties and ribbon bows non-stop. it was like i was preparing for an army of babies hair!

the feltie shown here was inspired by a super cute outfit sent by my sister.... and it just HAD to have the perfect flower for her hair!

Hand Print Wreaths

nothings cuter than tiny hands! and nothings cuter to me then comparing my 3 year old and my crawlers hands to each other. so we decided that the hand print turkeys we made at thanksgiving had to of course be followed by hand print wreaths!! and it kept the 3 year old entertained with a glue stick for a good 2 hours.... he did the gluing allllll by himself. i'm so proud.

Like a Fabric "Head Board", but totally not!

i have been wanting a fabric head board for EVER. literrally ever. but i never seem to have the right space for it. this house is even more irritating because when the furniture is oriented how i feel it should be there is a window completely not centered on the wall behind the bed. and of course the window is not centered over the bed either! and of course my husband won't let me just build a ginormous headboard to cover the problem. see below, window is a problem!!

what to do right?? well i decided i need a big cornice and a giant white flowing fabric panel below it. so i got started trying to figure out whether or not i'll love or hate it. what do you guys think?

i'm liking the direction... now to find time to build the cornice!

Initial Gift Tags

now, i don't know about your 3 year olds, but mine can't completely read his name yet. if it starts with an "h" he thinks it's him. honey, it's not. so i decided to get my tired scissors out again and make some initial gift tags to put on the kiddos presents. you know to hopefully clarify which one he should be opening. cause the crawler LOVES to rip open presents!!

we also decided to wrap santa, just so they could enjoy the ripping! i didn't think about how the tags were going to spell "Sssshhhhhh" i thought they were pretty cute, and actually the hubby did too. but at first of course he thought i was being a nut. but it did work! 3 year old easily identified which present was his, and his sisters!

gave mommy warm and fuzzy feelings! :)

Fabulous Flea Market & Valentine Decorations

i decided to completely go out on a limb here and put some of my hair accessory stock up for sale at a flea market the tiny town is having this weekend. it's their first. i'm used to a much larger scale f.m. in t-town, but this has a whopping 40 booths! and side note, only 16 have sold.... but i'm staying positive and hoping for some fun!

so i've been getting the goods gathered! and the tablescape planned. and my shutterfly site revamped. and business cards printed. and hair goodie tags made. and crafts galore finished.

a preview of my madness below!

Shew!!!

see there's a reason i haven't been typing so much!!! but i'm back on the wagon. with a way late resolution to keep up with this blog! so don't give up on my yet! i've got a bunch of healthy recipes to throw at you soon too! i'm on a weight loss mission right now!

ya'll do me a favor, check out my shutterfly site and give me some feedback, in your spare time of course!

http://designsbymeg.shutterfly.com/

"Home"

2009-12-03T13:25:00.000-08:00

This is dedicated to the house I'm missing...

with its shiny, but completely uncomfortable to lay on floors.

and it's stripe-y, happy foyer.

you've come a long, long way since we scraped you clean of your popcorn ceilings and 70's spindles...

you didn't even whine when we bared your studs, widened your doorways and yanked out your cedar beams!

however the hubby didn't really appreciate the fall thru the ceiling when all he was doing was wiring for new cans....

we had one joyous christmas triking around and thru ur new studs and over bare concrete

and one where the ride was much smoother.

we enjoyed making you more beautiful house!

I got the Blues…. Holiday Blues no less!

2009-12-03T12:27:00.000-08:00

I’m seriously walking on new territory here and I’m not just talking about my zip code!

Never, ever, ever in my entire life have I suffered from Holiday Depression! Now maybe there was a moment in my teen years when I didn’t think “Santa” was going to bring me a shiny new cd player or something, but nothing of this caliber! For the first time EVER I actually cried while opening Christmas boxes… it was completely tragic.

I typically dig out all 20+ (who’s counting) tubs of decorations joyously on Black Friday while some crazies are out shopping. I have Christmas music blaring and a fully lighted and decorated house by Saturday. This year I was missing “home”, friends, family, and decorating was oddly depressing!

This would also be why it’s taken me so long to suck it up, finish decorating my house, and find a few happy words to write about how I survived…

So now that I’m sorta satisfied with the overall decking of my halls, I thought I’d bounce back and share some pictures….

We use a pre-lit tree and I currently own way to many color combinations and sizes of glass balls to decorate with… this year I’m extra proud of myself because the only new Christmas decoration I purchased was a stocking for our newest family addition, the Crawler. Yes, this is completely A-typical. I normally acquire way too many new things every year which is how I end up with all those tubs…

See, cute pink trimmed snowman stocking, huh? Another complaint with our new house is no fireplace, which also meant no good spot for stockings! This year the only thing I could come up with to hang them on was a coat rack, its working. I haven't decided if I love this spot but it is functional.

I read somewhere (and I’m full of regret that I can’t remember which blog it was on about clustering ornaments) I tried this in 2 different combinations, bronze, champagne, blue and red and silver. Love the effect!!

Tiffany blue and red is my prominent color story in the living room… so I carried it around to anything looking un-cheery. It’s somewhat ironic to me that while suffering from the Holiday Blues, I came up with a blue inspired theme that started my decorating. Sidenote: If you look closely you can also see that I haven’t dusted yet… Good one Megan!

I think I was unknowingly trying to decorate all my accessories that I loved in our old house. So my screen got holiday-ified too! (No, holiday-ified probably isn't a word but if I only used real words I would be very limited.)

But soon I started running low on blue decorations and I opened two tubs of holiday dishes… so I started breaking all my decorating rules and modified the color story to red and GREEN in the kitchen… I know I live on the edge! :)

Yes, I did empty my hutch of most of my pottery collection to make it work with the rest of the business in the room. (Pottery is now hidden away in every available spot in the entire house!)

Notice anything about these candle holders?? I started turning them upside down. I like the way the “foot” cradles the candle holder. Didn’t remember that I had done it until my hubby questioned why they were this way. Because, hubby, that's why!

This year both the kiddos got a tree in their room basically because I have a strict ornament policy on the big tree: They must match, They must be orderly, They can only be whatever I choose them to be. SO that takes a lot of fun out of ornament hanging for my son. His tree is exactly what a 3 year old boy’s tree should look like – a fiber optic mess! The Crawlers tree is fitting for an 8 month old girl who’s mommy hung her ornaments, so that’s the one that got photo’d.

So I finished off the day by hanging some of my dominos that I painted after reading the shanty2chic’s blog… I have been scooting them around the house singing Van Morrison’s Domino, unsure of where I needed a domino. I finally decided around the Vegas poster art! DUH Megan!

I’m pretty sure that I’ve beaten my Blues since the house is now cleared of tubs that are still really full of decorating goodies. But all main living spaces including, of course, the main bathroom, are feeling festive! Now, this being said I'm happy with my results but not completely celebrating them... but given my frame of mind its better than the decorations remaining in the tubs!

I also called all four Mommies that I know in this town (yes, sadly that's it)and scheduled a Girl’s Night without husbands and children. And I threw out all the leftover yummies from Thanksgiving so no one got food poisoning and I would stop eating them!! I think the key to this holiday survival was in part due to my tasty stuffing leftovers that I stuffed myself with. AND a good amount of bourbon in my holiday glass didn't hurt either.

Here Turkey, Turkey Day.....

2009-11-24T12:54:00.000-08:00

There's a lot of things I need to be doing today and blogging didn't even make my "To Do List". But hey, this year things are going a little differently around the house! In order to accomplish ANYTHING I had to trap the crawler for a bit...

Typical Thanksgiving celebrations in the past have included me dreaming up menu items for a minimum of a month before hand, planning on how to seat 20-40 people in my house at a table (everyone MUST sit at a table which is decorated beautifully) and then I slave away at cooking for a 24-96 hours... But I think I mentioned this before - we went low key. We are not traveling somewhere to celebrate with friends and family. And we didn't invite anyone over to celebrate with us, truthfully there weren't many invite options....

But the hubby still insists on cooking, not eating out (YES I did actually suggest that). So today was a prep day, here's my progress and my menu so far....

Great Grandma's Noodles

I started making grandma's noodles around the age of 12 because I love to eat the dough. I do, I admit it. Noodles in my family are the end all tradition. My grandma slaved for days to make her grandma's recipe, enough to feed all 30+ kids, spouses, cousins, aunts/uncles and grandchildren. They are made of 5 ingredients, seriously. But its all about the rolling, and rolling, and rolling to make them super thin. Make sure you free up all available kitchen real estate before starting, noodles take up a lot of space!

Then patiently waiting for them to dry enough to slice, super thin again.

But your not out of the woods until you get someone to stand by the noodle pot and stir, patiently, continuously, the entire time they cook so they don't burn. If you master it they are delicious!
Want the recipe? I will share...

Great Grandma's Noodles
4 cups all purpose flour
4 eggs, slightly beaten
1/2 cup milk
1 tsp (ish) salt
1 tsp yellow food color

Beat the eggs in a large bowl, add salt, milk, and food coloring. Add flour 1 cup at a time and mix after each addition. Turn out onto floured surface and roll and roll and roll. Let dry until they don't stick together but they are still bendable. Roll up and slice and let dry some more. Freeze or cook when dry.

Buttermilk Chive biscuits

This is a trial run recipe I found on the smittenkitchen, and adapted slightly. (I'll share the adapted recipe once I bake if anyone out theres interested!) Now, biscuits don't really seem appropriate to me, but the recipe sounds delicous so we will see! I mixed and shaped and froze them this morning so they are ready to go....

Turkey Brine

I admit now, I am traditionally a turkey brine snob. I brine, I must brine, and there's only one kind of brine for me the great W.S. apple spice brine.... But what do you do when there's not a gourmet food store in your zip code and this years budget isn't showing $16 extra dollars for fancy bottled brine.... well I made my own! Hubby's idea, he was completely on board with me gambling with the safety of his bird! I won't share the contents of this latest kitchen madness until after I have tried it out... but it is making my kitchen smell amazing! When will the internet have smell-o-vision?

So thats my work for the day.... tomorrow I tackle stuffing (not from a bag, or a box) and pies....

Hope your all having a fun & peaceful time in your kitchen!

It once was a hall, its now a family portrait Gallery!

2009-11-23T08:49:00.000-08:00

I already feel that I'm behind on my blogging... funny how quickly THAT happened!

It's been a busy weekend, turkey day's right around the corner, and even though we're going super low-key this year I'm trying to get the house in order. Yes, yes I do LOVE a project!

So this weekend I entertained myself but most likely not my unbelieveably understanding husband by painting "frames" to frame my portraits in the hallway... I'd been avoiding hanging them until I got this idea out of my head and ONTO the wall! :)

I really like how it turned out...

In my haste to accomplish this latest idea obsession, I didn't take a single "in progress" picture.... sorry about that! When you get an hour of kid-free time you make the most of it. To make my use of time most effective, I had a prepped a lovely holiday turkey project for the boys to work on and the baby to watch. And of course I also blocked the hall with chairs as back-up to keep the kid, crawler and hubby away!! That's how I got one entire, peace filled hour to accomplish this!

But it didn't hurt that I had already made a supply list in my head and all needed items were in my house:

SW Tree Branch Paint
SW Metallic Glaze
4' level
Paint tape
Whatever paint brushes aren't currently "stored" with paint
Pencil (I actually found one!)
and last but not least, something round to make my corner details... this ended up being a nifty paper plate holder

After a little pencil marking: 18" down from ceiling, 22" from ends of wall, 30" up from base board.... and using the level to make the "box", I dug out the paper plate holder (all my bowl lids were too small) and made corners. I put tick marks (in pencil, it washes off) on the plate holder to make sure I got in the same spot each time.

I masked everything off with paint tape, except the corners, it was free hand - don't be scared! And seriously minutes later PRESTO there was a frame and the Hubby was shaking his head at what I'd just done to the wall. :)

After yanking the tape I decided YES it does need a metallic glaze. This is the point where the Hubby starts telling me to STOP he likes it, he likes it. But I didn't listen. I was going for the look of an architectural panel with some texture on the wall. It's all about the texture.... so I glazed away! Striae here we come!! He still isn't big on the metallic but he says truthfully he really really likes it. AND so do I!

But I do admit (only to myself of course) that the metallic glaze was entirely unnecessary, and made the tight space with its fancy low-voltage lighting even more difficult to photograph.... *sigh*

Linking up!
Remodelaholic

It WAS the great pumpkin... its now my soup!

2009-11-17T11:40:00.000-08:00

Its cold, its rainy, and its a completely ridiculous idea to go anywhere besides the kitchen in this kind of weather, so it is definitely a good day for testing out ideas!

I have a theory lately that I can heat the entire house just by using my oven. Today I decided to prove the theory! So at 9 am on a Tuesday, after consulting the bff, I start roasting pumpkins. No fall decoration pumpkin was safe, unless that is, it was made of foam or clay! No, I don't have something against pumpkins - I actually LOVE them. But I also think I'm ready for the next big holiday decorating, so knocking them off one by one seemed like a tasty plan.

After chopping and scraping 2 of those babies and filling 3 baking dishes I reconsidered exactly how much roasted pumpkin was NECESSARY in my freezer and took a break. Only to crank the oven back up and roast some chicken breasts just to conserve electricity (it was already preheated, you know). But chicken is not the point of this story!

Pumpkin, roasted pumpkin and the soup that was created is actually the point!

So anyone who knows me probably also knows that I read too much and probably too quickly. It may sound sad but I even read recipe books and blogs, only 20 or so daily. In between I watch the food network whenever I can sit still. So somewhere in my head I had this thought of a Pumpkin Curry Soup recipe existed... I searched EVERYWHERE thru all my piles of printed recipes, books on the shelves, blogs, you name it, I was there.

OK, I may have exaggerated, I only looked for like 5 minutes before I realized the problem. My blog hero's recipe was actually for Squash and Carrot soup with Curry.... OOPS! What now?? What to do when your OCD brain is set on one thing - PUMPKIN! Pumpkin Soup. Pumpkin Soup with Curry. Well I decided it was time to make pumpkin soup! Isn't a pumpkin technically a squash? I might add the results were freaking good.

Yes, yes, I will share the recipe. Please be amused at my first attempt at a blog in general... I was so excited I decided today was as good as any to start one!

Roasted Pumpkin Soup with Curry

1 onion diced
2 stalks celery diced
1 tbl minced garlic
3 tbl unsalted butter
2 tbl olive oil
4 cups roasted pumpkin
4 cups chicken broth
1 cup cauliflower florets, small pieces
Curry powder
Salt & pepper

Sauté onions, celery, and garlic in butter and olive oil until translucent and add salt and good amount of pepper. Add pumpkin and heat thru, don’t boil, it can and will burn. Add chicken broth and cauliflower and cook until cauliflower is tender. Puree with immersion blender. Add curry powder to taste.

Garnish with chives and sour cream.

Side note - the cauliflower was added only because I needed to use it. I thought to myself, why not, its not like your paying attention to any recipe anyway! And it did end up adding a nice texture and flavor. This recipe has not yet been "tweaked". But you can bet that it will be! I have enough pumpkin ready to go from this mornings efforts to make about 4 more versions! Typically I don't write any recipe that comes out of my head down nor do I try to guesstimate what amounts of ingredients I just used.... I'm trying something new today, besides a pumpkin soup!