Blog dump

Frankly, I'm surprised I even remembered my login information to this blog. Poor thing, so neglected.

As of 15 minutes ago, I am having serious home decor motivation/lack of inspiration. First, let me dump some projects on you that I've actually done since I started teaching (surprising that I would even find time, but when I get the urge to craft, everything takes a back seat.)

I found this little beaut while stopping by the parents house one evening. My mom had it in a pile meant for trash, so I took it! I'd been wanting to recover a lamp shade for a while now (lamp shades are so expensive...Even the ones at Wal-Mart are over $15.00...)

So as soon as I got home, I ripped that old crumbly fabric off and made it into this:

Presto Bingo - perfect addition to our superiorly boring entry-way. It's still a work in progress.

Kennedy & I also spent some time one weekend re-painting a guest bedroom in anticipation for company this Thanksgiving. 

Here's a before:

It had become a catch-all for junk. My sewing machine was in there, along with a twin bed and a pile of unfolded (clean) laundry. Shame on us. It was so easy to shut the door and never look at it.

I have an in-progress photo, but it isn't entirely complete yet...Maybe I can talk myself into continuing blogging if I have something I need to update soon...

This is post-paint, but pre-re-install the baseboards. We also inherited a nice queen-sized bed from Emily & Patrick that will come in handy with the aforementioned company. Can't wait to share the final after photos!

Finally, I'll share some things from my Science Lab!

Here's a picture frame I painted so I could "frame" out my objective for the day...

You can see the finished product hanging over my board in this picture, if you look very closely....

And I might as well share the other view of my room, pre-first day of school. Now the tables are all crooked from kids pushing them around. And my table labels are all ripped off and in a landfill by now. Middle schoolers are messy.

The new dilemma is what the heck to do with our dining room. We bought a craigslist dining table that is now just not working for me. Still no dining room chairs. Plus there are many limitations to the room. HELP ME!

It's true...

I lied.

I said I would blog yesterday, but then I didn't. I've been putting it off for over a month (with valid reason!) but I am back, my friends! Who knew life would get so incredibly busy this summer? I thought summer was for laying in my crystal clear pool (thanks to my wonderful pool boy/husband.) Unfortunately (or fortunately, however you choose to look at it,) I have been busy training to become a teacher! I have finished about 120 hours of classes all about teaching, I have passed a test that qualifies me to teach 4 subjects in grades 4-8, and I am busy plugging away at job applications. I am a little worried at how close to the start of the school year it is, and me without a job, BUT I must have faith that I will find something!

So with all of that plus my normal responsibilities, you can see how I have had little time to do household projects, let alone blog about them.

And the truth is, where do I even begin??? I feel like I almost have to reintroduce myself to all 5 of you reading. Thank you for still reading.

Let's just refer to this post as a photo-dump. That way, I do not have to follow any rhyme or reason in this post. It will be somewhat of a stream-of-consciousness picture book. If there has never been such a thing, well here it is now!

Last I blogged, I had just come home from a dear friend's wedding, followed by some fun time with Stephanie & our mother-in-law, Jennifer.

Here we are at Jennifer's wedding. This seems to be the only decent photo we have where Kennedy isn't drenched in sweat. Unfortunately, we tend to lose track of time dancing at weddings and forget to get photos before-hand.

The wedding was beautiful, magical, sentimental, and perfect. Here are a couple of photos of the bride - I hope she doesn't get mad at me for blogging about her....

Jennifer got married, and it was in and of itself a milestone event, but the post important part of that weekend was that Jaclyn & I found a tree to hang off of like animals.

So, good thing! We were starting to get worried we'd never be able to scratch that off our bucket lists.

Next, I jetted over to St. Louis for a fun conference. Here are Stephanie & I with a couple of celebrities!

So that's the abbreviated recap of my past month. The rest was spent in a classroom, learning how to teach. 

Now I can't leave without sharing at least ONE project. I've really been able to get a few things done in the past month, so perhaps I'll share things worth sharing over the next few blog posts. Unless I decide to take another month off.

This one is something I've been looking to do for a while now, but haven't been able to find the right frame. I'd been trying to find an old, cheap framed photo or painting that I could convert into a cute bulletin board for my laundry room. It was really feeling kind of monotone in there for a while, and I thought a cork board would warm it up a bit.

Here's the before thing:

A little paint, distressing, glue and cork board, and I had a nice, new addition to my laundry room! And the whole project cost me $3.00 (for the frame.) I already had the paint & the cork in my house!

Now that my busy season is winding down, I have a long list of household to-dos to do (how'd you like that?). Expect more updates - CHEAP updates!

Hello Yellow!

This blog is long overdue for a little sprucin' up! This feels a little more summer-y. Also, here's to hoping this will inspire me to get some other projects done.

It's been a long time since I've said "I'm bored," but it happened to me today. Actually, it kind of crept up on me in the last couple of weeks. My sleep pattern has been awry since Jennifer's Bachelorette party, which is causing my days to be filled with naps.

Note to self and others: Don't stay out 'til 3am. Just don't do it!

Anyway, bored means I just don't want to do anything. LORD KNOWS I have plenty to do around here. Instead, I'll just complain about it and not do it. 

EXCEPT FOR THIS!

The following project is a little variation on the Custom Etched Bar Glasses post. This time, I took a handy little gift card to Hobby Lobby (Thanks Mel & J.T.!) and found some amazing green glass jars on clearance! The big one was $5 and the smaller one was $3. Cha-ching! Or, score? 

I left Hobby Lobby with intentions of brandishing the jars with dog bones, or dog paws, or some cute dog pun. I wrestled over it all day, thinking it would "just be so cute" to etch one or all of those things on each jar. After all, I have been wanting some cute jars to display dog treats for a while now.

Then my judgement got the better of me, and I decided that dog-related decor is a slippery slope. Same with cat-related decor. I am, for now, going to keep it to a minimum by only decorating with photos of my dogs, and giving & receiving birthday cards with pictures of dogs doing hilarious things. (That might also be a slippery slope, but I'll keep you posted.) 

Here's the project:

Chalkboard Jars

What you need:

- Glass or ceramic jars

- contact paper

- craft knife

- chalkboard paint 

Draw some wavy rectangles on a piece of contact paper. Stick it to the jar. Make sure most of the jar is protected by contact paper if you are using Chalkboard spray paint. If you decide to go the paint-on route, then you should be good...

Here's what mine looked like after I was done with the spray paint.

Then once it was dry, I peeled off the contact paper and voila! This was a nice, easy, quick project, that semi-cured my boredom.

Because when you're bored, you want to see quick results so you can go back to sulking and watching re-runs of The Nanny, but still feel like you accomplished something today.

As far as what I'm going to write on the little chalkboards, it will be dog related. For now. But I like the versatility that the chalkboard surface offers. Maybe one day I'll use it to label a specific kind of cookie or snack. Or "KEEP OUT".

Aaaaand we're back!

I can't remember if I've used that title before, but if I have, oh well. My hiatus seems to have come to an end. Whether coincidence or subconscious, I don't know, but it has fallen on the exact same day that I am finally rid of all things bothersome concerning the dreadful fence fire.

Please re-read that last sentence out loud. With a British accent. I won't tell you how, but trust me, it is relevant to the fence fire.

Now when I say I'm back, I don't mean I'm going to write another post about how annoying that whole "FF" ordeal was ("FF" is code for Fence Fire, in case you didn't catch it...) No. When I say "I'm back," I mean, I have a new project to share! And I'm in love with it. Even KENNEDY is as excited about it as I am.

(Not to say he doesn't ever praise or appreciate my work, but I believe much of it is of little consequence to him.) Did I even use "of little consequence" correctly? I'm just in Jane Austen/proper/British mode or something....

SO MUCH GOING ON IN MY HEAD RIGHT NOW!

Let's talk about this project. And while I'm at it, I'll go ahead and provide a tutorial. This project was inspired by a project done over at http://www.susieharrisblog.com. She did an entire board full of type-writer keys and numbers. It is amazing. I'm definitely going to be making it for our office (when I finally get around to working on it...)

Type-writer Keys Vanity Coat Rack

(TKVCR)

Materials needed:

1 - 1x8, cut to size of your preference

Black craft paint

Round things (paper plates, cups?)

Printer

Pen

Brown paint or stain

Polyurethane

Mountable coat hooks

Some screws and stuff

I literally had everything I needed for this project in my garage. The mountable coat hooks were bought at Pier 1 a while back with this project in mind, but they were like a buck each. Hobby Lobby (aka HEAVEN) has a large variety of knobs and hooks. Knobs would be cute mounted as a coat rack (I know, because my mother-in-law did it. And it is cute.)

1. So first I cut that 1x8 down to about 40". You can do more or less depending on your space or what have you.

2. I primed the board (back and front) with white primer. Then I measured out for spacing purposes and traced 4 circles using a small paper plate.

Can you see my pencil marks? The flash was pretty bright... Just look closely. You'll see that I did, indeed, trace circles.

3. I painted the inside of the circles black. (..with black craft paint. If you have a different type of black paint lying around, use that instead! It really doesn't matter.)

Here they are all painted in. Sorry for the funky camera angles....

4. I printed out the letters in my last name to fit. Based on the size of the circles, I knew I needed letters the size of 1/2 a sheet of paper. Not to get complicated, but using photoshop, I was able to size them correctly. The font I chose was a 350 point Georgia (caps lock). 

So it was pretty big. But you want the letters to be the correct scale. If they are too small, then it won't look like type-writer keys anymore. But if that's what you wanna do, then go for it!

For some reason, the photos I took for this project look horrible. Maybe because I kept turning my flash off. So that's why.

5. Center the letter within the circle and trace over the letter using a ball point pen. TRACE HARD, so the lines show up. Then, take a slightly smaller sized circle and trace inside the black circle. (see below)

Because the paint was pretty fresh, it actually picked it up where I traced. So it's nice and easy to see. That's important, because...

6. Paint inside the letters with white paint. Also, paint over that new circle you just traced, BUT don't paint all the way around. Just do it in spots so it looks a little worn..

(Look closely at the white border circle to see what I mean.)

7. Then right after it dries (maybe 30 minutes later?)...Take it out back and rub some brown paint/stain on it. Rub lightly for less distressing. Rub a little harder for more distressing. Rub more brown paint along the edges and corners for a more aged look.

8. Once that dries, give it a quick coat of polyurethane to protect any more paint from chipping off.

So that's how you paint the sign! I gather I don't need to add steps on how to attach your hooks. 

So I attached the hooks, and I also attached a couple of picture hangers on the back so it would be easy to hang. Just thought I'd throw that out there too. But I won't hold your hand through that. Mostly because I didn't take picture of those steps.

But I WILL show you one more final project picture!

I think this project took a couple of hours to do. The thing that took the longest was painting in those letters. Is your name like 16 letters long? Then make the circles smaller. Or, just use the first initial. Or make a monogram! Possibilities are endless.

Yay for me! And yay for you if you decide to make this. 

Calming Stripes?

Well, it's been a while. But that doesn't mean that I haven't been busy. Kennedy and I have caught the renovation bug and are running with it! I can't stop doing things to this house. Hallelujah for this renewed energy, because it only took a weekend of painting right when we moved in to overwhelm us.

We finally took advice that was given to us by practically anyone who knows anything, and are going at it a room at a time.

This time, that room is the bathroom!

I stole this idea right off of one of my favorite blogs, Young House Love. They did this in their bathroom, I loved it, and I had to have it.

Here're the befores.

This horrible green faux finish wasn't so horrible at first glance. However, spending morning after morning getting ready in this bathroom (it has the best natural light of all the bathrooms in the house,) I got sick of it. You can't tell from this photo, but there were screws and nails and holes scattered in the walls as well. And LORD KNOWS I wasn't going to try to match this faux finish to cover them up. Ew.

Also notice that the cabinets and trim are that lovely cream color that we love so much (not).

Here it is at another angle. Gorg.

So I painted the trim and cabinet white. It now matches the tile in the shower and the lovely tile counter top. Kidding about the counter top. I hate it. But it will have to wait until I'm rich enough to get a custom marble-top vanity. Or until I can find something I like on Craigslist. (Who wants to place a bet on which one it will ACTUALLY be???)

Here it is!

And listen, those stripes took me a long time to tape off, so if you don't like them, keep it to yourself!

Elvis took this picture.

Here is some custom art-work. I took all those photos! You might recognize the one on the right from my Photograblog, (also a little neglected at the moment), while the other two were taken at a park in Sioux Falls on the very last day we lived there.

And here's the last one from a different angle. 

Is it wrong to want to be in this bathroom all the time now?

Thanks, Heather!

I wanted to give a shout to Heather H. for giving us a great color idea for our shutters and front door! Kennedy painted them over the weekend while I was out of town (and apparently almost fell off the ladder & died - can't tell you how guilty I'd feel if that happened! Not to mention devastated...)

But I digress...

Here's our house this summer after Kennedy risked his life cutting a bunch of tree limbs down (The man's an adrenaline junkie).

According to Neighbor Karen, the previous owner (once-removed?) thought it was a good idea to paint the shutters and front door the exact same color as the roof. But to me, it just looked horrible and boring!

Heather H. suggested we do black shutters with a red front door. I wasn't sure at first, because I thought we probably needed to just paint the whole house a different color. Maybe one day we will, but for now, I'm loving the mini-facelift! (And I think Neighbor Karen is, too!)

(What's that weird glow all over the picture? OH, the sun?!?!?! That's right, it's practically 70 degrees outside.)

So here we are, no leaves on our trees, and the deadest lawn in the history of suburbia. But man, do those shutters and that front door look great!

And here we are a little closer so you can see that we do have some green up there. Plus, this is a pretty good red for a front door. Did you know a red front door is supposed to be good for the feng shui of your home?

You can bet a new lawn and some other landscaping will be on our project list in the near future! I have another post coming up soon that addresses some detail about the fireplace (i.e. how the mantle was built.)

And for the anonymous comment about the office, well, just you wait! The office is pretty high on my project list as well!

Poodle Doodle!

Before

After

Taking projects and knockin' 'em out! This little puppy will go perfectly in my new laundry room (there are a few finishing touches and then I will reveal it!)