A Handy Dandy Link to All My Projects

One of the things I've been meaning to do forever for this blog is create a listing of all of the crafty projects I've tackled over the last three and a half years. Well, I finally did it!

Right above this post you'll see the word "Projects" on the menu bar. Click it, and it will take you to a listing of all my completed projects. OK - full disclaimer here, I cheated a bit and created a Pinterest board where I pinned all my projects. Hey - I am a busy girl and I didn't have time to individually list each and every project! :-) Anyways, please return to your normal Wednesday affairs, whatever they may be. :-)

Little Braedon

This is Braedon at 8 days old.

Normally, when I do newborn shoots, the babies are about a week old, and sleep like rocks though the whole session. Not little Braedon! He was wide awake and happy for most of the two hours I was there. It was so much fun for me to get shots of this little guy's eyes!

Braedon's momma is so pretty, and I loved getting some family shots. 

He was super happy to be held by daddy - slept like a champ. :-)

And then he just cuddled in and slept, and I could hardly stop myself from taking pictures!

Braedon's momma told me that she discovered when he was a few weeks old that when he was very fussy, what he wanted most was to be put down and left alone. Can you believe that? What a sweet little guy. Thanks for letting me come hang out with him!

The Living Room Today

The most recent pictures I have of the living room are shortly after we finished revamping the room in 2009.  Click on that link to see all the befores- yeesh, this room was a trainwreck. :-) But, as you'll see in the afters, we fixed it up. Everything was nice and clean and freshly painted, and we made do with the furniture we had, making everything look as nice as possible. I still absolutely love the paint color we chose for this room (Oyster by Glidden) and the way we redid the mantel to make the awesome woodwork stand out.

Getting rid of the fluorescent lighting and the cork glued to the walls really did a lot for this space. :0) But, the monstrous loveseat ate up that corner of the room, and there were a few other things I wanted to change up, along with adding some art on that right wall to fancy it up a bit. Here's that same view now, from a few feet back

It definitely feels more open and airy, which is important, because this is a long narrow room, dominated by the mantel at the far end. The scale of the antique loveseat fits that side better, and that cream rocker is moving out of here in the near future, which will lighten things up even more.  The right wall now displays the art I made, along with franchute and the pair of blue chairs.

Lover and I are having a very friendly argument over the height of those frames. He thinks they are a little too low. What do you think? Here's a better picture of that whole side of the room.

The opposite wall still looks pretty similar to when I showed you the new lamps and pillows.  Of course there are the new end tables, and the piano isn't jutting out into that corner anymore. 

I'm thinking about restaining Lover's coffee table. It's gotten a few nicks and scratches over the last five years, and I think a darker stain would help differentiate it from the floors a bit. We'll see.  Okay, now, if you stand with your back to the mantel, this is the view from that side of the room. 

The piano is tucked away, the curtains frame the window nicely, and the light just streams in through that window. I love those huge sliders in the living and dining room.  They let in gobs of light.

So that's the living room today. Cozy, light filled and well used. We spend most evenings in this room. We entertain here, watch movies, work on projects... you name it, we've probably done it in this room. I'm pretty happy with how it looks today. :-)



 

Art, a Pillow and a Freshened Up Living Room :-)

For the past eight months or so I've been working on a few little projects in the living room. Up until this point our renovation process has been: rip out all disgusting messes that we inherited, slowly repair and or replace all the bones of the room, paint, move in some furniture, add some decorations, and call it done. There are so many rooms and projects, and so much dinero involved, that we don't take the time to make each room perfect before moving on to the next. Especially because something usually happens like a basement flooding or concrete stairs crumbling or deck stairs splitting in half and so we move on to the next urgent project. :-) Oh, and I am also incapable of making quick design decisions in our own home. Other people's homes - not a problem. Paint your room blue! Recover that chair!  My house? Paint the room..... yellow? white? gee, I just don't know. I think I'll take eighteen months to think about it. :-)

Ok, back on track. I recently completed a few projects in the living room. I said that already. I told you that we replaced the mechanic's waiting room loveseat with a pretty little antique one, and that I found a matching blue chair at a garage sale, and that I painted franchute. I also ripped off the hideous contraption that the previous owners put on the piano, and replaced it with the original top and music stand. I also made two pretty pillows out of the fabric I bought in NYC. OK, so now we are all caught up. :-) Here's what I did next:

Made a flower petal pillow. 



I was inspired by this shabby flower pillow project and thought it would be fun to make my own. I used some leftover linen, and sewed the petals wrong sides together so that they would fray over time. I really like how it came out, although when used it does get a little smooshed and wrinkled, and that bugs me a little.

Painted two watercolors of scripture verses that are very important to our life right now. 

Once I completed the franchute project, and got that wall looking better, I knew we needed some art that would fill up that wall more than the poster we had up there before. I found these three huge frames (they're 24"x24") at the Christmas Tree Shops (where else) for just ten dollars each and I knew they would be perfect. They actually came with those inserts to add in a million pictures but I knew that I'd be changing that. Lover and I talked about which verses to display, and settled on 1 Corinthians 15:58 and Galatians 6:10 - both verses remind us to make sure our lives are focused on others.

I love watercolors, and it was super fun to design the text with a variety of fonts and then just take it to have it blown up to the right size. Then I traced it onto the watercolor paper, and started painting away. Super easy and so pretty.

Made a flower petal paper art piece. 

This one was inspired by the pillow, and also something else I saw online but now of course can't find. I bought a pack of Taj Mahal inspired scrapbook paper from Marshalls for $3.99 that had all sorts of cool glittered, embossed and stamped sheets. I also purchased an oval punch from the crafty store, and spent a day punching out little ovals from all the papers. Then I spent another day gluing them to each other individually, creating that flower you see in the middle of the frame. The goal was to have it look like a flower, but in the end, I think it ended up looking more like a Tibetan sand mandala.

Which I am cool with. I like how the different patterned papers pick up all the colors in the room. This project took more time than I thought it would, but it looks really nice and it will be easy to swap out with a photograph or different artwork when the mood strikes.

Bought a new lampshade. 

So much better than the faux leather cone one that was there before. Thanks Lowes!

Covered the glass of the builtin cupboards with contact paper.

I love having the storage of the builtins in this room, but I don't love the glass. Everything just always looks messy inside, unless I arrange it perfectly, which defeats the purpose of having lots of storage! I tried wrapping paper on the inside, to add a touch of pattern, but it was too busy. Then I tried fabric, but it was too opaque and looked weird. Finally I decided to try frosting the glass. I was all set to buy a frosting kit, but then I remembered how Thrifty Decor Chick "frosted" her pantry door with contact paper.  And since a huge roll of contact paper is only 5 bucks, I decided to give it a shot.  And I think it looks great. It softens the outline of the stuff inside that it's not constantly bugging me. Follow TDC's instructions, they really made this a simple project.

Bought new end tables.

Pretty much since we bought this house, I have been looking for a set of nice end tables. And looking and looking. I've stalked Craig and his list, looked at garage sales, and shopped in stores. Nada. Until this month. I finally found the right tables for the right price. $35 for both! Awesome sauce. They are much higher than the other tables, which is nice for drink setting and lamp lighting. They have two huge drawers, which is great - more storage! They've got great lines, but they do need some TLC. They are a little scratched and banged up, and the one on the right side has a broken handle. They match franchute really closely, so I think switching out the handles will help them look a little different. So now I just have to decide - do I want to paint them? Strip them and refinish? Both? :-) I'd love suggestions.

Hung pictures up over the piano.

Lover took that big picture when we were on one of our trips to NYC. I love it so much. The rest are pics I've taken and I am pretty happy with them. Which means I am sure I will switch them out soon. :-)

Touched up all paint and filled holes.

No picture here, because why on earth would you want to see such a boring picture? :-) But it really did freshen up the room.

Scraped the sides of the windowsills to get all the paint, tape and spackle left on them. (Not all that was entirely my fault. :-)

Sprayed the curtain rod brown-black to match the one in the dining room.

See dining room curtain rod picture. The living room one now looks exactly like it. :-)

Whew! Now, before you get all "wow, you have accomplished so much, when do you ever have time to sleep?", remember that I work from home, my photography business goes down for the count during the winter months, and oh, yeah, I already told you this took me eight months to accomplish. Or nine. Who's counting anyways? :-)

Next up, I'll show you pictures of the whole room. Have a great day!

Life Uncluttered

Hey there! I am guest blogging over at Life Uncluttered today. Come visit me and check out my top ten cleaning items. :-) There are a whole bunch of other top ten lists that are fabulous as well!

Come on over!

The Life and Times of a Frenchy Dresser

Boy do I have a treat for you today. :-) The long awaited reveal of the frenchy dresser that I affectionately dubbed "Franchute" (Fran - choo - tay). Meet Franchute.



Ok, first up, you need to hear how I acquired said dresser. Last year I was trolling Craigslist for a new coffee table. I knew I wanted something fancy looking, sturdy and substantial. I found a few potentials, including this one and emailed them all. I never heard back about this little frenchy dresser. Or so I thought. Over a week later, I got a call - are you still interested in this dresser? Am I interested? You betcha. So Lover drove me forty minutes out of town to get this little dresser that I had my heart set on. We hauled it home and I set it up in the place of the table that Lover made, and I loved it. And then we started using it. And this happened.



Rings! Spots! Water marks! EVERY single time we dropped a single drop of water on this table, it would leave a mark. Needless to say, it drove me bonkers in two seconds flat. Add to this problem the fact that I felt the table was a smidge too high, and bulky looking in the center of the room, and it wasn't long before the idea of making this our new coffee table was scrapped. Plus, call me sentimental, but I missed the table that Lover made me in our first year of marriage.



About the same time, we were finishing up the loveseat, and had gotten rid of the old behemoth one that took up half of the right side of the living room. And then fate smiled on me and I found a perfect match to the blue chair we already had, and I knew that I wanted to replace this



with the blue chairs and Franchute, once he had a makeover. So I hauled that guy down to the basement and started in.

The top was stained, and the bottom and drawers were painted. My plan was to simply refinish the top in a very deep dark stain, and then choose a fun color to repaint the bottom and drawers. So I started sanding.

And lo and behold, the wood that was under that horrible stain job was freaking AMAZING! It is seriously some of the most beautiful grain I've ever seen. :-)

I saw no reason to cover that up, so I did one quick coat of Dark Walnut from Minwax and let it dry.

See that awesome grain? My goodness. So pretty. Then I applied four coats of Wipe On Poly in a Satin finish. This is the same finish I used on our coffee table, and it has held up perfectly for almost five years with daily abuse (read no coasters, crayon drawings, etc) I finished this in January, and we've been using the dresser since then, and it looks perfect.

So then I had to decide on a paint color. I thought about blue or a light coffee color, but decide to break out of my safe zone and paint it a deep purplish red. I hemmed and hawed about two different color choices - Perfect Plum and Royal Garnet by Valspar for quite a while. I even put it on Facebook for a poll. Royal Garnet won overwhelmingly, which was great, because that was the one I wanted anyways. (Hey, it had a cooler name! :-) And I painted the base the next day. This is the pic you saw in February.

I ended up doing three coats on the base, and then wiping a quick coat of stain (again, the dark walnut) over the top. It deepened the color a bit, brought out all the details, and helped the paint relate to the stained top. Then I started on the drawers. Kill me now. My plan was to strip the paint out of the middle insets, stain them and then paint around them. This process took me four more months. :-)

After much work, sweat, and tears, here's how they ended up.

Lovely. But it took a while. The paint on those drawers was STUBBORN and I actually had to repeat the whole process twice. The first time the drawers looked disastrous. Now they look lovely. :-) I also stripped the paint off the little gold handles by boiling them in a pot of hot water with baking soda. Worked like a charm. Yay!

Ready to see the whole ensemble? Here's the before again to remind you:

And the lovely afters:

I love it. It has drama and va-va-voom. :-) It's incredibly functional, but still so pretty and sassy. And isn't that bowlful of peonies on top just to die for? All my peony plants bloomed this year, and they are gorgeous.

The ruffles! The tiny pink petals! The drama! :-) Ok, I am done. Oh, and isn't it freaky how well the new blue chair matches the one that came with the house? :-) I love when that happens. And when chairs are five dollars at garage sales. :-)

I am currently making some new art to go above the chairs and dresser, and it's coming out great. :-) I'll show you as soon as it's done. Or four months after. Whatever. :-) Have a great day!

All you get is random...

My brain has been too scattered lately to put together a proper post, and we are currently three hundred miles from home... so today all you get from me is scattered. :-)  Here are a series of completely random things rolling around in my brain. :-) (Both times I typed brain, I first typed brian. See what I mean about scattered?) ;-)



First up, I finally finished Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens. :-) Which means that I am right on track for my goal to read a classic a month, if this month were February. :-) But it's shaping up to be a wicked hot summer, so me thinks I will have lots of time to sit and read while avoiding the heat. (and any other responsibilities that may come my way) :-) I struggled with Oliver Twist, because Dickens wrote the majority of the book in the colloquial language of Londoners many years ago, and it was a little hard to follow. But I managed to get the gist of the story, and enjoyed the suspense that he built from the very beginning. Boy could that guy tell a story! :-)



When I am feeling scattered, I make lists. This week's list of choice was yet another house list, things to complete, replace, repair, etc. broken down by room. It was therapeutic. My goal is to have it all done in the next five months. (This is one of three pages) Ha! :-) That would be awesome, but it's so not happening. :-) Seriously, though, making a list makes me feel like I have a plan, and that makes me happy. I like plans. When we bought Wendhurst Castle, we talked about how long it would take us to fix it up and Lover threw out "five years" very casually, with no commitment to actually being done in five years. I strongly disagreed, stating that I couldn't see it possibly taking us this long. Ha. We're in year four, and still haven't tackled the big stuff like kitchen and bath renos (although we ARE renovating an entire basement) so me thinks Lover's estimation of five years was generous. :-) He's so much better at predicting how much time things will take than I am. Darn math geek. :-)



We have now stayed at this hotel twice, in two different rooms, and they have the same print in both bathrooms. I love it. (Sorry for the crappy pic, its in a hotel bathroom with no natural light) I love the vivid green, and the way the little rain drops look like watery ladybugs. I think I need to recreate a pic like this and hang it somewhere in my house. :-) Maybe in MY bathroom? :-)



Living in a hotel for a week while Lover is at training means that I have a lot of free time. Which, of course,  I use productively for things like business work, reading etc. Or possibly playing SIMS. Please tell me I am not the only person over 20 years old that still plays this game... hello? It's just so gosh darn fun.



And finally, because I told you this post was completely random, this is my all time favorite mascara. Maybelline's Classic Volume Express in Brownish Black and Waterproof. It's the only one that doesn't end up all over my eyes by the end of the day, washes off fairly easily, and goes on thick and non-clumpy.  I've tried other Maybelline mascaras, CoverGirl, Clinique and even that new Physician's Formula Organic stuff. All terrible. Maybelline took this off the shelves for a few months while they redesigned the packaging, and I nearly had a heart attack. I feel like maybe I should stock up on this for the next fifty years. Will I still wear mascara when I am 77? I feel like it is a strong possibility. Does anyone know how long mascara keeps unopened and in its original packaging? :-)

 

So that wraps up Random Thoughts on A Thursday. Bet you're glad you spent this time reading my crazy thoughts, hmm? I thought so. :-) Check back next week when I will hopefully not be so scattered. No promises though. :-)