Tissue Paper Wreath

I have been sort of coveting the tissue paper wreaths I have been seeing here and there. I started a search on Etsy to investigate different looks and styles. Then I saw some of the pricing and any thoughts about "maybe just buying one" went right out the window. Good ole' Martha hooked it up with a neat little tutorial in her crafts section of her site.

This tutorial details the construction of pom-poms and luminarias. Now that you know how to make the individual pom-poms, here is the cheapest and easiest way to construct the wreath. Instead of making a trip out to purchase a foam or wire wreath, I decided to look around the house for something I already had. After realizing that I did  not have any spare foam wreaths lying around, I opted to grab a wire hanger. I cut the hanger and bent it around to form a makeshift circle out of it. Then I started twisting the wire "stems" of each individual pom-pom around the wire hanger form. Although a bit tedious, not difficult in any way. I waited to expand each pom-pom until I had stacked the entire hanger. This made it extremely easy to get my fingers in and individually tether each one. Once they were all attached, I began fanning out each pom-pom. The last step to get the desired shape was to scrunch and pull at each pom-pom until I liked the arrangement and size.

Gave some interest to the antique window!

Love it! And now time to change that dreaded light fixture!

Ceramic Garden Stool

This ceramic garden stool has been on my "wish list" for quite some time, but this gal could not get past the typical price point of $100 + on these bad boys. So like many other things, I simply kept an eye out and sent good thoughts out into the universe......and IT WORKED!

I was peaking at some items on Craigslist and saw an ad for a Jingdezen planter (for $20). Intrigued, I clicked and nearly fell off the couch at this:

Yes, I know that it doesn't look like much, but it had the drum shape and the height I was looking for. After some quick email negotiations (which was basically me stalking the seller until it was mine), she wound up in my work shop. And with my hand poised with a can of white satin finish spray paint, I got right to making it into what I wanted.

2 very thin coats worked really well. I find that it is really important when letting it dry that you are aware of the air temperature. If it's too cold, I find that you can get these annoying little bubbles. (Lil' side note love for you there.)

Anyhoo....back to this lovely....Here she is all painted purty!! I am in L.O.V.E with it. It could not fit more perfectly in this spot!

So a new chair and lil' side table. What a great decor day! Woot woot!!

Queen Anne Reupholslipstery

Sometimes I find that I fall asleep and wake up thinking the exact same thing. Usually its something related to the mountain of laundry I have or appointments I made for the kids, but sometimes it revolves around a design idea. Once it sets, I cannot stop thinking about it. Although sometimes this is a plus because it motivates me to jump out of bed at a sprint, other times it can keep me from actually resting at night.

So last night I sat there, in the dark, thinking about the Queen Anne's chair I scored off of Craigslist. This chair came home with me in the early fall and it has sat collecting dust in our basement ever since. I had all these noble plans at first to re-upholster it and well, frankly, I was a little overwhelmed when I started taking it apart. Plus, I could not seem to find a fabric or pattern that I liked. The late last night I thought today was the day. I was going to just get after it with that old chair. I accepted that it may not work out and I also accepted that I may be pleasantly surprised. As a reminder.....

Ya....not so much, right? Initially I started removing the mauve fabric, but I realized that it provided a little extra padding. This would provide useful in that I wouldn't have to apply more batting. So on it stayed!

To begin, I grabbed the other half of the West Elm duvet (one half is now the new shower curtain) and begin to drape it over the chair to see how this was going to work. It was here that I decided that this would be reupholslipstery. Basically a cross breed between a slip cover and a reupholstered piece! This also helped so that I could get the pattern in the right spot!

Bray thought it was pretty awesome to have a chair in the middle of the kitchen.

From there I tacked in the bottom piece in order to provide a spot to pull the fabric from. This was super easy with my power shot stapler!

I rounded the fabric under for over the leg area. From here I just worked upwards and out using my stapler to secure the fabric to the wooden frame.

The arms started to become a little tricky so I really spent some time here manipulating the fabric in order to get it just right. I was determined that I would not whip out the sewing machine. After many attempts to fold it the right way, I ended up with a fold to accommodate the curve of the chair. Enter the brushed nickel upholstery tacks! (Oh and maybe a quick trip to Lowe's)

To make it work, I cut the fabric and made a square which I then tacked on with the upholstery tacks to hide the seams of the multiple sections of fabric coming together.

The ends of the arms were looking like a problematic area until I realized I could pop off the pieces at the face of the arm and cover those in fabric. This made life much easier as I could gather the fabric however I wanted as it wasn't going to be seen!

Yuck!

Yippee!!

At this point I went around and added some tacks in areas for mere cosmetics. A quick hit with an iron to work out some of the wrinkles that formed while I was working and........drum roll for the before and after shots................

'

Whad'ya think peeps?? Spot on, hate it.....? Be brutally honest! I learned so much and will be able to A.) do it better next time and B.) do it faster (but not too bad for a first timer!)

I am so happy that this project only cost me $3.00 in upholstery tacks because the chair was free and we all know the history of the duvet!

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Goodwill.......Oh GOOD TIMES

Can I just say how much I LOVE when you hit Goodwill and it's like the stars align and POW there are all the things you have been secretly wishing for! Here are just a few......

For some reason in my master bedroom redo, I was noticing that our PB linen lamp shades were blending into the background wall color on our nightstands. There just wasn't enough contrast.

Not doing it for me.

I had in my mind that I wanted some of that tealy blue there to compliment the new window drapes. Enter the Goodwill run!

Found these cuties....

Way too blue, so I doctored them up with a little teal spray paint. After switching out the harps (the bowed thingy that the lamp shade sits on....technically speaking of course), I was able to get the linen drum shade to sit how I wanted.

And now I think it looks soooooooooooooooo much better than before. I actually notice a subtle difference right when I walk in the room. As I say to the Hubs...."don't they just make you happy?"

My next two Goodwill transformations are going to be amazing. I am so excited just thinking about them (and the money saved!) As always, stay tuned......

Shared Family Bath Chair Rail

Whoops.....I know I said I would post pics yesterday of the bathroom and I totally forgot! We hosted a much overdue insanely great family dinner and I was simply too pooped to type! The bathroom looks phenomenal and, for about $8.00 in chair rail stock, we achieved the exact look we wanted.

Although we still have tiling the bathroom on our to do list, we can at least check this off the list (there is currently some dreadfully awful linoleum on the floor.....eek). The installation was super easy. There were only two corners that needed to be mitered, so all in all it was a cinch. One helpful recommendation if cutting your own pieces would be to draw a mock picture of the bathroom. Measure each length that is needed and write it on the drawing. This sketch will help when you want to make all your cuts at once. Then "dry fit" each piece by holding it in place to make sure it aligns properly before nailing it into place.

The dreaded "before"...so vanilla it was painful!

2 coats of Bison Brown paint up to 35 inches from the floor.

For whatever reason, I got a little excited in the corners and went way too high with paint.

WHOOPS...this is what the Hubs calls a "holiday".

After the chair rail was in place, I went around and filled in all of the nail holes and seams with wood putty. In order for rails and moulding to look polished and continuous, this is a necessary step that provides BIG rewards in the finished product. Next we sanded them down and used Benjamin Moore Dover White to paint the chair rail.

We love it and it is just the change up this shared family bath needed. The whole project only took about 2 hrs start to finish so I can't complain. Easy on the wallet and easy on our weekend! Plus it left plenty of time for partyin' at family Sunday dinner!!

Master Bedroom Cubby Update

Well as I said in my previous post, the order of items on our to do list has changed. The kitchen has now become the focus.....which is A-O-K with me. The idea is to install subway tile, crown on the cabinetry and build a custom kitchen island. Ambitious? Yes. Do-able? TOTALLY. So that being said, the cubby built in that was to take place in the master bedroom has been shelved temporarily. In order to make that space work for us in the interim (and to alleviate my insane "that cubby is like an eye sore" mentality), I decided to create some shelving and make a little spot to do emails etc.

The dreaded "before" shot.....dum dum duuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuummmm. A couple of things come to mind when I look at this.....like what in the world was the builder thinking when creating this nook? Rather than sit and complain about it, I am choosing to embrace it and make it work for us. To start, I took two old wine crates that were collecting dust in our basement and painted them white.

I figured they were structurally sound (having been used to lug wine in a previous life) and most importantly they were FREE. While waiting for these to dry, I went ahead and covered the plain white shade on a little antique lamp a friend passed on to me. This is such an easy update to do and only required some fabric (leftover square from earlier project) and some hot glue strategically placed around the edges. I find that it works best if I faux cover it using wooden laundry clothespins to eye how it looks, line up patterns etc. Then I slowly remove a clothespin and apply a little hot glue underneath. After the glue is applied, I re-attach the clothespin until the glue is set.

Super cute and since we have not installed our lighting yet, it is totally functional to brighten up this nook. Lastly I simply had to hang up the wine crates and add some decor. I used wall anchors when hanging both crates so that I wouldn't have to worry about them falling down or worse yet, ruining our wall. I started by pre-drilling two holes in the crate. I placed the crate on the wall and used a level to make sure I was perfectly aligned. Next, I used a pencil to "dot" where the pre-drilled holes were on the wall making it very easy to drill in the anchors. Lastly, I just had to place the holes over the anchors and put in the screws.

It's super cute and light which I wanted. It will totally serve it's purpose until a more permanent solution is achieved.

Here are the "before and after" money shots!

Again with the Beans.....I JUST CAN'T STOP

Hello again.....the Bean Lady here....oh man. It's getting out of control. I just love how darn cute these lil' beans are!

These lil' babies are in our master bedroom and I did a little "bean" action in the bathroom as well. Speaking of the bathroom.....we have jumped ahead a bit in the order of items on our "to do" list. Check out my bean laden linen (say that three times fast) drapes in the bathroom.

Just a little pop against the hard line between the brown wall and the white drape. Super easy too. Just dried black beans and fabric glue. So since I have already launched into a shot of the bathroom, I will give you a sneak peak at the awesomeness that is taking place in there!

Armed with the Bison Brown paint used in the entryway project, I headed into the upstairs bathroom. After catching me mid pour, the Hubs suggested adding some architectural interest with a chair rail....and well the rest is history. Will post final pics of the finished product tomorrow!!

Beans...Not Just for Dinner

Saw this during one of my late night internet surfs and I could not wait to try it out. I have been looking for something to make a few of my frames pop out a bit from the wall. And best part.....you may already have all the "ingredients". BEANS! Yes, we all decorated with dried beans in grade school, but this is the big girl version, I swear. All you will need, besides nimble fingers, is your trusty glue gun (or crafting glue), dried beans and frames of your choice. You can apply the beans in any manner you like. It gives a graphic pop and I love it. I have to wait until morning before banging any nails to hang these bad boys (bambinos are sound asleep). Can't wait! Stay tuned for shots of them on the wall!