Every season the lovely Katie Bower from BowerPower hosts a challenge to actually MAKE something you've pinned on Pinterest. What a genius of an idea...to actually stop pinning, get off the computer, and get to work. Sherry over at YoungHouseLove is in on the whole shebang, and I've really been wanting to be one of the cool kids and join the challenge, but up until now it has snuck up on me and I haven't had enough time to a. complete the project, or b. take pictures and blog about it. Well not anymore my friends! You can count me in with the cool crowd today, because here is my first official Pinterest Challenge project:
A pea towel! Not really. It's really a dish towel, but pea towel sounds like tea towel, and that makes me smile. It's is originally from Anthropologie, but no longer available, and since the pretty things at Anthropologie also cost a pretty penny, I decided to make my own version. This whole project cost me around $6.00, and the dish towels online at Anthropologie range from $16-$24, so I'd say I did okay.
First, I took some plain, off-white, bottom weight fabric I had lying around, and ran it through the laundry to get any shrinking out of the way before I started sewing. Then I ironed and ironed and ironed, and, much to my dismay, still didn't completely get the wrinkles out. I laid my fabric flat on the floor and laid another dish towel over it so I could easily cut the right size, and so I could ensure my cutting was going to be an even rectangle, and not a wonky parallelogram. As you can see, my fabric was a little short if you take a seam allowance into account, but I decided it wasn't too much to worry about...my new dish towel would only end up being about a half an inch smaller all around.
After my cutting, I ironed and ironed and ironed again. Those who like sewing had better like ironing, because it seems like every time I sew anything, it's 90% ironing and 10% sewing. Either way, I folded down a 1/4 inch seam allowance and ironed all the way around, and then repeated this process again so I had a nice, clean edge, and so my fabric wouldn't fray. After all the ironing was done I just ran a straight stitch around the edge, but you can picture what the finished project looked like. I think it's worth mentioning here, that my ruler that gets used at LEAST once a week, is the same ruler that I received in the 5th grade for reaching a certain point level in Math SuperStars. And it still has my name flanked by bright red stars, baby. Cool points for this girl! :)
So many crafty bloggers out there who are FAR craftier than I am have used Martha Stewart's new line of multi-surface paints and raved about them. I bought the chalkboard paint for a project and ended up returning it because it was so terrible, but because I can't hold up to peer pressure, I decided to give them a second chance (and because Martha was the only one who had the exact perfect shade of green). The color is called Green Olive, and can be used on glass, fabric, wood, plastic, and pretty much anything else you can put paint on.
I had originally planned on just using my finger and doing fingerprint circles, but I found this round sponge brush in my craft box underneath my ruler, so I decided to try it out.
I think part of what makes this towel so cute is it's imperfectness, so I didn't try hard to make perfectly round circles, or to evenly space everything. I just dipped and pressed, and went with the flow.
At first I was a little concerned that the paint bubbled when I lifted the brush, but the bubbles cleared up in drying, and everything turned out A-Okay.
I let everything dry for about 7 hours just to be sure I wouldn't mess anything up, and then I took a black Sharpie paint marker and drew circles and dots on all of my "peas" as in the original towel.
I needed to somehow write "Give peas a chance" on the bottom of my towel, and I just couldn't seem to get my handwriting neat enough to put in permanent marker, so I googled some fonts and ended up with one called "Pea Amy G" (hilarious, right?) from here. The easier way to do this would have been to print out my saying and then trace, but I wanted to get practice writing it before I used my permanent marker on the towel, so I traced from the computer onto a piece of paper, and then went over it again with a dark marker.
You can see one of my feeble attempts at trying to free-hand copy a font at the bottom of the page. It's not pretty.
I traced my tracing onto the towel with pencil to make sure I had the proper spacing and to double-check that it was centered and straight, and then traced again with the permanent paint pen.
The Sharpie paint pen was actually really easy to write with, but I have to complain and say it wasn't really paint-like. It was basically like writing with a Sharpie marker, but it didn't bleed as much on the fabric. It still smelled and wrote exactly like a Sharpie marker, and the handwriting did bleed a little bit, but not much; Just enough to make me want to try a different type of paint pen the next time I do a project like this.
I LOVE the finished project! I think it came out super-cute, and it adds a little whimsy to my otherwise bland kitchen. This project was start to finish in one afternoon if you take out the time for the paint to dry, which is awesome for people like me who always start new projects because I get impatient with other projects that take so long.
So now, I can officially say, Winter Pinterest Challenge: COMPLETE!
When it came to hanging things on the walls in our house, I wandered aimlessly like a lost puppy dog in a park with no people. It was sad. For the first 5 months of living here the only thing I hung on any wall in the house was this picture by the front door in the porch. And to make things even more desperate, I hung it with command strips so that I could take it down if I developed hanging regret.
I think part of me was afraid to put holes in our plaster walls, and part of me had no clue where to start. How do you decide what to hang and where in a house full of blank walls? All of our pictures and frames shuffled from pile to pile and eventually ended up stacked in a pile of their own in the sunroom just waiting to fulfill their destiny. Then it happened. During one of my many hours spent on Pinterest, I stumbled upon this:
Solid. Gold. Exactly the inspiration I needed. This is actually Thomas O'Brien's first New York City apartment, and I love everything about it. I love that you want to actually stand there in his bedroom to get a better look at the gallery wall. I love that this room is so liveable and comfortable. I love that he played up the natural light with the mirror. And most of all, I love that the chaos of everyday life blends right in with everything else. Because I would really be kidding myself no one if I tried to make our house perfectly staged like Young House Love's dining room (which is gorgeous, but completely unrealistic for clutter-pros like us). Our house would look like a constant disheveled mess that was trying to be modern and sleek and it just wasn't working out. Like Donald Trump's hair. One hot mess.
The only thing preventing me from starting this project right away was the bookshelves. I have a bagillion books and have wanted a "library" since I was 5 and watched Beauty and the Beast. I mean, who WOULDN'T want this??
What were we talking about again? Oh right, bookshelves. I had been hemming and hawing over purchasing library-style bookshelves from Ikea since the week we moved in, but something just didn't seem right. I couldn't figure out what my hesitation was, but I was driving Brian mad with my back and forth-ness on the subject. All of my books were just in piles in the living room, out of the way, but certainly not pretty. I finally figured out that I felt the tall bookshelves would dwarf the room, making our largest, most open room seem smaller. I also don't have enough books to fill an entire wall of bookshelves, and to top that, I couldn't figure out where the bookshelves would actually go in the room. Lots of decisions and zero ideas. Which is why this Thomas O'Brien picture is solid gold. Waist-high bookshelves! This thought had never even crossed my mind. First of all, they wouldn't take over the room, second, I could fill them with the books I currently have, and third, it would give me somewhere to actually put stuff, like candles and pictures and keys.
So the bookshelf search began with a fervor. The best possibility I could find online was this Billy Bookcase from Ikea:
It was a good height and plain and simple like I was looking for, but the length was set and there were no other options. In order for these to look like built-ins, I would need approximately 2.5 on one side of the wall, and 3.2 on the other side of the wall. The other negative? Even though the bookshelves are cheap individually, to buy 6 of them would end up around $250. And they wouldn't look so great with half of a bookshelf on one side and a quarter of one on the other. Here's where I call my dad, master craftsman and general fix-it pro. I once told my sister, who was 2 or 3 at the time, to take her popped balloon to dad because "daddy will fix it."
Just before Christmas he brought over 2 custom-built bookshelves the exact height and width and depth I was looking for, and all I had to do was slap some paint on them. Since I wanted them to look like built-ins, I planned on painting them white, the same as the molding, which meant he could use the cheaper plywood. He had a few items on hand in his garage-turned-workshop, but said the sheet of plywood and the backing came out to about $30...waayyy cheaper than ole Ikea.
After a few coats of semi-gloss white paint with a thin foam roller, they were ready to roll. I waited a few days to let the paint cure so it wouldn't get nicked and dinged while I was setting them up. My books fit nearly perfectly, and I had so much fun finally hanging pictures on the wall.
It's it great? This is by far my favorite part of our house right now. It screams Kindra. Nerdy, eclectic, busy, and sentimental, all on one wall. And, to make things even better, it serves a purpose! My books are finally off the floor and nicely organized, and we have a place to put our keys when we come in. And it was FREE!! With a little creativity and "borrowing" from my parents house, I didn't have to buy anything to complete the wall.
As you can see, Fulga is front and center, mainly because it's the biggest piece of "art" we own. I plan on painting over it with a quote or something so we don't have to stare at creepy naked painters all day. I mean, maybe naked painters are your thing, but we would rather go a more conservative, non-creepy route. Other than Fulga and the mirror, I didn't have any specific idea of where I wanted pictures to go. I just started hanging and figured out what worked. It didn't matter to me that the pictures all evenly spaced, so it was kind of nice to just go with the flow and figured it out as I went along.
My mom had the mirror resting on her mantle until a few years ago when we bought her a giant clock to take its place, so it has been residing in the back of a closet ever since, and it was just the size I needed. It really does a great job of bringing extra light into the room, and since this room has no overhead lights, it also amplifies the lamp-light.
When we were measuring for the bookshelves, we made sure to measure for depth as well. Since the door opens up to the wall the bookshelves would be on, they couldn't be so deep that they would obstruct the door. I knew some of my large coffee table books wouldn't fit, but I wouldn't rather find someplace else to put them than have a front door that doesn't fully open. I'm not sure what our final measurement was, but I think it was about 9" deep, and as you can see from the picture, the door still opens more than 90 degrees. (sorry for the evening pictures...the flash is rough on the glass and the lighting is all off)
Now, if you'll allow me, I'm going to share a little bit of what makes me so happy about this wall. Other than that it was free. Did I mention that already? FREE! :)
I've always been one who scoffed at the thought of decorating with pictures and furniture from big box stores where everything always looks the same and pictures are just color on the wall and nothing more. I feel a home should reflect the people who live there, and part of that means pictures and wall-hangings should serve a purpose of offering a little bit of insight of who the people really are. Well, our gallery wall offers 27 different stories about who we are, and since I don't want to bore you to death, I'll share just a few. And yes, that is double-sided tape stuck to the bottom left mirror. Further evidence that D-S tape is my favorite thing and is literally used in everything I do. No joke. I just hung curtains yesterday and used D-S tape to hold them in place. It's like magic on a roll.
One obstacle on when hanging pictures was the thermostat. It's nicely placed smack dab in the middle of the house, and it's definitely not the prettiest thing to look at. Mr. T does a nice job of helping to mask it though. Brian picked him out from the Lake Eola farmer's market, and he is very proud of his contribution to the wall. I don't really know who Mr. T. is/was, but I DO know Friends, and this is one of my all time favorite Chandler moments: (Seriously. Watch it. It will make your day.)
Above the thermostat on that same side of the wall is Roy. B. Bird (aptly named by me), my favorite picture at my grandparent's house, a colorful cross stitch piece my grandpa made. My grandpa was really phenomenal at cross stitch, and most of the pictures hanging in their house were either my grandma's paintings or my grandpa's cross stitch. The colorful bird one was my favorite since the first time I visited their house in Houston, and unbeknownst to me, my aunt had written my name on the back, "claiming" it for me. I have no idea when she wrote my name on it, but after my grandmother passed, it was sitting there waiting for me. Honestly, I think it's probably my favorite thing on the wall. Thanks Aunt Linda!
Towards the end of hanging stuff I started running out of pictures to put in my frames. I didn't want to go to the store and print pictures in the right sizes, so I got creative. The quote is a quoteable card that I had in my "stationery box" that I just taped directly to the wall, and the key was our first key to the house, before we changed all the locks.
Yes, the Vizsla picture was crooked when I took this picture. Yes, it's driving me crazy. I bought sticky putty to keep everything straight and aligned after I took this picture. Really, though, the purpose of this picture was the mask. If you read my blog from Italy, then you remember this was the mask Sergio made especially for me. It still is one of my favorite things, and now it has a proper display so everyone can enjoy it.
That's it for me. The other pictures you're just going to have to see for yourself. :)
Here's a fun fact about our house. You know that moment where you're all cramped in a tiny room around conference tables signing away the next 30 years of your life to a mortgage payment, and then after your hand is cramped and your signature no longer looks like your signature, the mortgage broker and realtor finally say "Alright, here are the keys to your new house!" ?? Yeah, that didn't happen with us. We finished signing everything and were waiting for that moment and everyone kind of sat there like "Now what?" So I finally asked, after an awkward moment of silence, if we could have the keys to our new house, and everyone kind of looked around at each other like everyone else should have the keys. No one had the keys to our house! So in a not so Hollywood moment, we had to call "Al," the now previous owner of our house, and ask him if we could have the keys so we could get in to our house. Classic.
Our house was purchased by "Al" in the 80's, and he had been renting it out since the early 90's, so for the last 20 + years, people have been in and out of our house, and who knows who still had keys or access to it. We considered calling a locksmith and having the whole house re-keyed, but after a few estimates and some time spent weighing our options, we decided to just install new door handles and locks. The existing door knobs were shiny gold and none of them matched, and there were different keys needed for the front and back doors. In order to play it safe, we just splurged and bought all new door handles and locks for the 3 exterior doors in our house. We spent the extra money and bought the Schlage re-keyable door handles (from Lowes) so that all the doors could be matched to the same key, and if we ever need to re-key the house, it's super easy to re-do ourselves, without having to call a locksmith, which would cost anywhere from $80-$150.
I have to say, neither Brian nor I have any experience installing a new door knob, and he was able to do this first one in a little over an hour. The directions were pretty straightforward and everything matched up, which made things easy.
We were warned in the store by another customer that the aged bronze finish scratches easily with keys and such, and she was very adamant that we should go in a different direction, but there weren't really many options and we didn't have time/patience to order something different off the internet, so we went against her advice and purchased them anyways. They come with a lifetime warranty so we figured if anything went really wrong we could try to exchange them through that, but so far we haven't had any issues.
They also have only 1 star in the ratings on the Lowe's website, but my only complaint about them is that sometimes the finishes are a little different. I had to try to match them up in the boxes to make sure I was getting 3 handles that looked alike, and even then one of our knobs is more of a matte finish than the other shiny ones, but not so much that anyone would notice but me.
After Brian got the first one installed it was too late to start the other 2 doors, but we were feeling pretty confident that we could have this project finished in no time. As you can see from the picture above, we need to sand/repaint our door, but I'm holding out until we paint the exterior of the house. We have 2 front doors, both of which you can see from the road. There's the most exterior one which leads to the porch, and then there's the door in the porch that leads to the living room. I can't decide if I want to paint them both the same color or if I'm going to leave the more interior one white.
You can really see the subtle copper undertones in this picture, which I love, and even though you can see finger prints, the finish really masks them in person, so I'm not constantly having to rub finger prints out.
I was busy doing other things while Brian was installing the locks, but from my understanding, I'm pretty sure you unscrew and separate the old handle, and then put all the new parts in place and then screw the new handle together. Easy as that. Except for that the other 2 handles didn't match up perfectly. We just got lucky on the first one. Mr. H had to come over and help drill and screw some things into place in order to get the other 2 locks to work, but everything worked out in the end and we no longer have to worry about who has a key to our house! And the best part? We just have 1 key for the whole house!!
I know it's not the most exciting post but it's essential to a new homeowner, so that's why I'm sharing. However, living room paint pictures are coming soon, and that IS exciting, so be sure to check back!
The original plan upon signing the papers and getting the keys to our house was that we were going to get in and clean, paint, and re-do all of the things that needed to be addressed immediately before actually moving in. Welllllllllllllll...Brian was a little more than excited about our new adventure, and consequently ended up like this on the very first night:
Let me break this picture down for you. That is a corduroy bean bag unfolded into a giant bed cushion with a jacket as a pillow and a c.d. player for noise, because sleeping alone in an empty house is scary even for the toughest of us.
The story of the Bevery Hillbillies begins one evening when my parents were over at the house along with Brian's family, who were smart enough to bring their own chairs:
Yes, that's right folks. I forewarned that the Beverly Hillbillies were moving in. :)
For some reason, on this particular evening, Brian and his parents were driving in separate cars back to our house, and they passed by a house on Summerlin with a moving truck out front and a whole pile of junk stuff out by the curb for the trash. Both Brian and his parents simultaneously noticed this treasure at the curb and turned around back to the house so they could rescue it from the garbage.
Isn't she a beauty (said sarcastically)?? I can't imagine why anyone would get rid of such a priceless piece of art. Her name is Fulga (what we thought was the artist's name which my sister later pointed out is actually "FulYa" but we still call it Fulga), and she currently resides in our living room to creep greet everyone who comes through our front door. More on that later.
So to make this long story even longer, upon rescuing Fulga from the trash pile, Brian noticed a whole bunch of treasures that could be salvaged, and instead of just helping himself, he went to ask the homeowners if it was okay if they dig through their piles by the road. The lady he spoke to was actually just a friend helping the homeowner move, who explained that the homeowner was 80-something years old and was moving up to North Carolina so her daughter could help care for her. Her daughter didn't rent a big enough moving truck, and consequently, the poor lady was having to decide which of her belongings to take and which to leave behind. They hadn't planned on this happening, and were leaving early the next morning to hit the road, so most of the "left behind" items were just being left at the curb. Being the charmer that he is, the lady told Brian he could have any of the plants on the porch, all of the lawn furniture, and anything from the yard that he wanted, which, if anyone knows Brian, made him happier than a kid in a candy shop.
Lucky for us, my dad and his 6-foot-long-truck-bed were back at the house, so we took a ride over there and piled the truck as high as we could. Brian had to ride in the back and we literally looked like this while driving through downtown Thornton Park:
I'm sure our neighbors were shaking their heads or laughing at us, or both, but check out the loot we scored for ZERO dollars!!
A teak wood table and chairs for the front porch in almost mint condition, along with a teak bench that just needed a new cushion to be like-new again.
Several outdoor lanterns, an iron bird feeder, and an old iron fire bell.
I think my favorite free score of the night was all of these plants and ceramic pots. Plants are ridiculously expensive from a nursery or home improvement store, and all of the plants and pots pictured here would probably cost around $350 if we were to purchase them.
We also brought home this lovely outdoor settee, chair, and ottoman set, which fits perfectly on the back deck, and other than the cushions, is in perfect condition. We stacked everything but the plants in the back of the truck and brought it all home in one trip. Brian literally had to sit in the back on the way home to hold everything in so we didn't have any runaways along the way. It was a good thing we didn't have far to go!
I eventually want to recover the cushions in something more cheerful and colorful, but they're in fine condition the way they are now.
On the other hand, the bench cushion was looking pretty raggedy, so I bought this fabric from JoAnn's along with a piece of foam cut to size so I could make my own. I just sewed 4 box corners and closed up the stitch around the foam and I had a brand new cushion! Even someone with zero sewing skills could do this.
The chairs for the table didn't have any cushions at all, and they were a little uncomfortable without them, but I wasn't sure I wanted to buy the foam and fabric for all 4 chairs. They were both pretty expensive and I used coupons when I bought them for the bench, but it would have been pricey even with discounts if I were to buy enough for the 4 chairs. I lucked out, though, when I was shopping at Burlington Coat factory one day and stumbled across these yellow beauties for only $3 a piece!! They fit perfectly and match our eventual yellow and blue color scheme for the exterior of the house.
Needless to say, we totally lucked out on our free finds and are extremely grateful for stumbling upon that lovely painting by the street one evening. We actually went and bought a card and wrote a nice little note of thanks to the lady who was so generous to give us so many of her lovely belongings. And, of course our house would never be the same without Fulga.
