Swing Arm Lamps

Once upon a time we were having dinner with some friends and one of these friends asked me if I had any use for a pair of lamps she didn’t need anymore.  She had seen what I had done with some hand-me-down lamps before and thought maybe I could work wonders on these.  But before I could even get a word in, Anthony piped up with a resounding “NO”. 

So maybe at the time, we had too many lamps.  I was going through this cycle, which really wasn’t a big cycle, of rehabbing a couple of lamps, finding more lamps to rehab, and listing the former ones.  So sometimes we really had a bunch of ununsed lamps sitting in our house because some were awaiting a little love and some were awaiting a new owner.  And I was totally ok with it. 

Anthony though, well, he was not.  Understandable.

Why do you care?  Well because one day during those lamp-hoarding days I was walking through Goodwill with all (three at the time) of the kids and what did I spot?  These:

They were marked at $8 for the pair.  Argh, I had to have them.  But I resisted the temptation because I love my husband so much.  But then those lamps haunted me and the headboard was a dream waiting to happen and I thought they might look so great with that headboard and so…I went back to Goodwill the next day, bought them, and immediately stuffed them under our bed when Anthony wasn’t looking.

And they stayed there for the next couple of years.

Doh.

One Room Challenge–Week 1

Oops, I did it again…

(Thank you Britney.  While I couldn’t give you role-model status, you will forever be a part of my teenage years.)

I signed up for the One Room Challenge!

My brain is still not sure why my fingers signed up BUT, we're going to go with the flow over here and cross another room off of our to-do list.  The great thing about the ORC is it provides LOTS of motivation! 

So, the room we are going to tackle is…

Our Kitchen in Print

I love writing this blog.  I love coming up with things and showing you how to achieve the same look/end product for less.  All of that requires lots of pictures tossed out into the interwebs of our nest.  While it’s great fun to get to see our house on a screen on the www, it’s EVEN MORE fun to see it on paper…magazine paper that is!!!!!! 

A few months ago I was contacted by This Old House magazine.  Katelin, the writer of their Budget Redo column, wanted to know if they could feature the kitchen in their October issue and golly gee, I said “of course”!  So, if you’re a subscriber (you can subscribe online too!), check out page 30!

I thought the kitchen’s debut in this month’s This Old House would be a great opportunity to check in on it and let you know how everything is holding up five months later (read the original reveal post here)!  How are things holding up to the test of time?  Well, most things look like they were done yesterday, a few not.

Interchangeable Framed Art–DIY

I probably should put some quotes around “framed” up there because I might be stretching the definition in this post but I’ll let you be the judge. 

I’ve had some VIPieces stored away that I’ve been wanting to hang over my desk area and so, when I finished the multi-purpose room, I finally got around to doing that.  Two of those things are matching wood frames that my friend Jesse gave me a couple of years ago.  When she gave them to me, they were a pretty turquoise and I think I had them hanging in Sebastian’s room that way for a little bit but then they got moved to our old master bathroom with a fresh coat of white paint and now they are above my desk and capable of quick switcheroos whenever the heart calls.  I know I have the cardboard backing they came with somewhere but they’ve never had glass in them so they really were begging to be something slightly different than the regular old frame.  As it turns out, a spotted wallpaper wall was just what they needed to shine. 

One is holding the Productivity Prayer from Lindsay Letters that she offered as a free download a couple of weeks ago.


Mine printed more gray than black and I’m not sure if it’s because she made it like that or if it’s because I’m running out of ink but I love it and it’s the perfect thing to have hanging over a work area. 
 
If you’ve read my post on loving allllll the people, you’ve already seen this one:

Wallpaper and a Box

Ahhh!  I’m so behind over here.  The thing is, I have been flying through projects in this little house in the past few weeks but, since I’ve been spending all of my free time painting and patching and hammering, there’s been no time leftover to fill you in in writing on the blog.  Bear with me.  I WILL get you all caught up.

(Pssst, the One Room Challenge starts in a little over a week and guess what?  Yep.  Yours truly signed up to do that whole, crazy six weeks again.  Needless to say, there will never be a lack of content on Bean In Love.)

Last post we left off with a multi-purpose room reveal.  You might’ve noticed the spots on the recessed wall.  1) They are all part of this great stuff I’ve come to know and love called removable wallpaper.  2) The entire accent wall only cost me about 20 beans!

Long story short, one day I walked into our local Target, which is going through a pretty major renovation, and saw an entire end cap full of clearance wallpaper!  I snagged two of these rolls of Devine wallpaper*…