Seeing Stripes

Anthony's parents were in town for Easter but before they came, I wanted to gussy up our guestroom - not that it needed any gussying up, I just needed a project.  :)  Sounds great, right?  The motivation to take on this minor makeover came the day I found out they had found tickets and their visit was a part of reality...aka 2 months ago.  The problem was that I just didn't have time to do what I wanted - more decorative pillows, a roman shade, lamps...  Well, I found time...a few days before their plane touched down.  The thing about last minute projects like this though is that, being a frugalista, deals are hard to find.  But, lucky for me, my guardian angel is also into interior design - the heavenly kind - and she pulled some strings for me.  :)

I've been hopelessly coveting this striped fabric over at Hancock Fabrics for a year now, but at $35 a yard, it was never my idea of "worth it", me thinking I could get half a weeks groceries for that price.  Well, I happened to walk in three days before Anthony's parents arrived and to my utmost joy and excitement, it was on sale for $8 a yard!  Still a little more than I'd like to spend, but since I only needed a little over a yard, who could complain!  Not me!  Plus, I got two pillows and a 'faux' roman shade (more details on that next time) out of it!

Home I went to whip up two new decorative pillows using my striped fabric for the front and some of the white shower curtain I used to make these pillows last month for the back.

Here are our new striped sensations:

The lighter blue in them matches our existing duvet cover perfectly and they add some "wow" factor into the room!  They also draw attention away from the bare walls, which we're not hammering into anytime soon since we're trying to sell this house.  The less holes to spackle over, the better on moving day.



You might've also noticed that the headboard got a coat of white.  It went from this:

 To this:

The end tables were also added awhile ago (found clearanced for $10 each) and won't stay dark for long either...just not sure what color they'll be yet...silver leafed? mustard or pale yellow with a glaze finish? light green? white with a painted pattern?  There are so many ideas in this little noggin', it's hard to tell what will happen.  :)

I Went On A Lampage - Part II

So you saw the lamps I found and I told the story of the green one turned white, but here's the story of the brass ones turned...green!  This is also the beginning of the story of the guest bedroom mini-makeover...just to keep things real.  :)



First, I taped, taped some more, covered the bulb sockets with plastic, and then primed.  A few nice and thin coats did the job.

Next came the green - Krylon's Ivy Leaf in a gloss finish.  After about five thin coats of green paint, I topped both lamps off with a couple of coats of glossy, clear acrylic spray paint (also by Krylon) for extra protection.

Before I show the afters, we must pan over to the shades.  I found two medium sized drum shades (Target brand) at a local discount store - one for $5 and one another day for $2.  On both shades, the tape holding the actual drum to the wire shade was coming off in places, hence why their present home had become a discount store, but it was an easy fix with a little fabric glue.  To add some more pizazz to the shades, I sought and found matching green ribbon to adorn them.  Again popping out the fabric glue, I glued one end of my cut ribbon to my shade (right over the shade's vertical seam), waited about 10 minutes, pulled the rest of the ribbon tightly around the shade, and then glued on the other end.  I "ribboned" both the top and bottom edges of the shade.

I glued the ribbon about a half-inch from the edge just out of personal preference, but aligning it right along the edge would also quite 'edgy', if you know what I mean.  :)

Total Investment:
2 Brass Lamps:  $6
2 Drum Shades:  $7
Green Ribbon: 50 cents
Fabric Glue:  already had
= $13.50 for two snazzy lamps perfect for our guestroom
Not bad considering this similar-looking lamp from Target will run you back $19.99 plus tax.  (I know, I'm really cheap.  Twenty bucks for a lamp is bordering expensive to me/us...)

           Lights on:                                                                                    Lights off:

Now that I've spilled the deets on my lampage, next up is the rest of the guestroom makeover starting with more pillows...I told you, I'm addicted to making them.  :) 

I Went On A Lampage

Quite literally...and this is only about half of it.  I found these three lamps at two different thrift stores.

The brass ones were $3 and some cents each and the green one was $6.  The story of the brass ones I'll tell later, but here's what I did with the green one (minus progress pictures...sorry).

First, after wiping it down, I taped off all parts that wouldn't mix well with spray paint, namely, the nickel part at the top, the entire socket, and the cord.  Then came the fun part, the spray paint.  You might be surprised to find out I spray painted it in the first place because it doesn't look that ugly.  Well, the truth is that it really wasn't ugly but I had glossy white on the brain and just had to paint it.  :)   

Here it is today:

I had to persuade Anthony to place it atop "his" dresser to add dimension, filling up wall space we haven't yet filled with picture frames...someday.

Read about other two lamps next week...and our guest room's minor makeover for that matter!  As for me, I'm in the middle of spring cleaning our kitchen - organizing cupboards, shining up stainless steel, washing the window, etc...whistling while I work!

And More Pillows

Like I said two posts before, I think I'm addicted to making pillows...or to my sewing machine at least.  Fabric stores are like candy stores to me now (they always kind of were but it's just escalated since I found stitch-witchery and received my machine).  A few days after I made my porch pillows, I got out my Bernina again and away I went.  This time though, I made pillows for our master bedroom.  The best part about these two stuffed squares though is that they only cost me a buck to cover...yep, that's right...one dollar.  That's because I used a Target shower curtain I found for $2 to make them.  :)

All of the inspiration and motivation for these pillows came from Jones Design Company, where Emily created and generously shared a beautiful stencil I knew I had to try!  She painted it onto her walls and I'm dying to try that avenue too (next house), but I tried pillow covers instead. 

Here's how it stenciled out:

First I made the pillow covers using half of the shower curtain using the same (probably unconventional) sewing techniques as my porch pillows. 

Then I pulled out the stencil I had just printed and traced onto cardboard.  In 20 minutes I had both covers stenciled and was bringing out the paint.

After contemplating what color to use, I ended up just going with the little bit of the blue-gray (Heaven on Earth by Benjamin Moore) wall paint we had left from painting our master.  It was free, it would match the room perfectly, and it would pull some blue onto our almost completely white bed.

So, after setting some newspaper inside the covers to ward off any paint bleeding that might occur, a-brushin' I went. 

I tried to be frugal with the paint use as all that was left was a light layer on the bottom of the can so I just painted a thin line over each penciled stencil.  After I was done, I realized and wished I had painted thicker lines since I had more than enough paint left but I was too excited to get them on the bed and move on so the thicker lines will beanother project for another day.

Here's our new, one dolla pillow covers:

I heart geometric prints!

On the flip side of my love-to-create life, I've been busy with all the things spring brings - Confirmation, babysitting, Easter planning, retreats, and more.  But I've still managed to fit in some projects here and there, including a minor guestroom makeover fit for parents.  :)  I cannot wait to reveal this one!  Until next week then, ta ta! 

Battle of the Rust

I did it!  I conquered the rust spot on our side, exterior door!  Well, as it goes with rust, time will tell if I really got rid of the problem permanently but for the past week we've seen no signs of intruding rust. 

This is what I started with:

(Sorry for the bad pictures...the door really is white, but I forgot to white balance the camera before I took them.) 

It was a just a little bitty spot but every time we walked in that door it drove us nuts as it was right at eye level.  Plus, we want to sell a 'perfect' house so it's away with any and all imperfections...so, bye, bye rusty. 

This was my plan of attack:

First I did some online research on how to remove rust on metal doors.  The best remedy I found (ehow.com) said to sand down the spot, clean it with rust cleaner, and paint over it with oil-based paint or primer (as water-based may just irritate it more - hence why it's probably bad in the first place because that's what we used to paint over it last year.) 

So off to Lowe's I went to pick up these:

Then I went to work.

First, I sanded and let me tell you, it was an arm work-out.  The spot had some bubbling so I sanded down until it was smooth and then sanded more until all of the rust was gone.  This is after sanding:

Next I cleaned the spot with full strength CLR...but forgot to take an 'after cleaned' picture.  But, since I had sanded all the rust off, it really didn't look that different cleaned.

Out came the oil-based primer and on went four coats of it over the course of the next three days.  Spacing it over three days was to ensure each coat was completely dry.  I painted four coats because I wanted to make sure that baby was completely covered and protected.

After each coat I lightly sanded the area with a less coarse sanding block to make sure I wouldn't have any paint lines since I was putting on so many coats.  Then I waited...and waited...and waited.  A week went by and no rust had reared it's head from under my oil-based shield so I went ahead and painted over the entire area for the flawless look I/we had been waiting for.

And there you have it!  No more rust!

.           .           .

Now that that's taken care of, spring cleaning in our laundry room has come to a close and I'm moving on to the kitchen...even though at the rate I'm going it'll soon be summer cleaning.  :)