Posts Tagged ‘home’

Zero Budget Project: Family Art

December 14th, 2012
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I’ve hung up two pieces in our house this week. That’s pretty sad considering I have about 50 or more pieces all ready to hang. All of our artwork is just hanging out in a pile in a nook in my bedroom. It takes up quite a bit of space so there’s not much room on my side of the bed. It’s amazing how hanging art will make a house look lived in.

We have a very blank wall above the stairway. It’s one of the first things you see when you walk into our home. It needed art on it badly. I had this vision in my head to do some lettering with all the nicknames we call each other and just fill the entire paper with those nicknames (kinda like Penelope’s old room sign -scroll to bottom). I’m still not sold on that idea, so I just did: Chris, Melissa, Penelope and Felix forever.

I went through about 7 sheets trying to get it all perfect and this is the best that I came up with. I’m still not thrilled about it. But no matter. I’ve got loads of this paper, I’ll just practice some more. It’s not very hard to replace the art, either.

I like the idea of something about our little family and our names and having those words fill the page entirely, bleeding off the page behind the frame. What do you think? What should it say?

Before & After: Rocking Chair

December 4th, 2012
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Chris and I made over this chair years ago. We found it at a second hand store in San Mateo for $30 and was clearly in need of some TLC. The previous owner had tried to make it over with a half-hearted effort and a can of black spray paint.

This was our first rework with paint remover and a tinted stain, and it took somewhere around 30 hours to rework. The spindles were definitely the hardest. Perhaps that explains why I went for a dresser with such clean lines.

This rocking chair looks worlds better with its new stain, and since we did it right the first time, the finish has lasted 5 moves! This is exactly why taking an extra hour (or 20) makes a huge difference when reworking furniture.

Zero Budget Project: The Dresser

October 5th, 2012
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I finished the dresser. It’s been nearly a year and a half since I bought it with the intention of revamping it. I knew if I wanted to get it done, I had to do it before the cold set in and I’d only be motivated to cuddle in blankets and drink a cup of hot abuelita (I’m hooked thanks to Celeste).

This dresser was originally going to be stained yellow like my rocking chair, but I kept feeling a nagging feeling that I’d be falling back on a crutch. I tend to fall into color ruts from time to time. In high school it was burgundy and navy. In college it was red and black. When I first got married, it was just black and tan. When we moved to Utah, it was yellow and black. Then it moved to yellow and orange.

Picking this color was a huge risk, because the guy behind the paint counter just mixed a bunch of colors and I went for it. There were no samples to go by (besides the paint stick he stained). I knew the wood on the dresser would take the stain differently because it’s not pine. It’s a veneered redwood or something warm like that. Maybe cherry?

I’m glad I went for the stain as opposed to an opaque paint, because the color and grain of the wood really shows trough to add a lot of dimension to this piece.

Also, I never consulted Chris on this color. I knew I was taking on a big risk by not asking him what he thought. While I was mid-job, he rolled in from work and I got more than a bit nervous for his reaction. Turns out he loves it! Bullet dodged. I do need to be better about communicating my home decor plans with him, though. He, too, bought this house.

Chris lets me use this dresser just for my clothes. He’s really nice about that. Atop the dresser I have a little ikea runner I made (fabric I scored for $1 a yard at a garage sale) to protect the finish from my accessories. My accessories are stored in Spice of Life jars and on an old 1950s lunch tray.

I’m proud of how this dresser turned out. Now I need to get our bed situation figured out. It looks like we’re going to buy a new bed for our room soon. And I want to make my first quilt for our room, too.

So have you ever stained wood a color before? I definitely think I’ll be doing that again with any other wood rehab projects I work on in the future.

Zero Budget Project: Bedside Stools

September 14th, 2012
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We’ve had these stools since we lived in California. It feels like 3 lifetimes ago when we were there. I bought two (one for each side of the bed) for $10 each. We’ve since resurfaced the tops with a bright yellow. But they’re just not quite right.

They’re dirty from all of our moves, too. Currently we have an expedit next to Chris’s side of the bed so we can house chargers, pocket contents, books, etc without cluttering up the room too much. (it’s still a cluttered mess, though) And I’ve got two of these stools on my side. It works in a very asymmetrical way, but I’m not digging on the decor in our room. I want to cool things down a bit, I think there’s too much yellow and orange going on.

Our bed is pushed up against a bold orange wall (seriously the color is perfect), so I’m thinking of introducing more cool jewel tones into the decor. I’ve been thinking about staining my dresser indigo, so the above fabric might be perfect.

I’ve been obsessing over plums and indigos as of late (see this month’s houzz ideabook), so when I saw this fabric at a yard sale, I couldn’t help myself. It was $1, and I have at least a yard of it. It’s sort of late 80s, early 90s, but I think I can pull it off. What do you think?

Yard Work and Gardening

September 10th, 2012
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I like to project in my studio on the weekends, but that didn’t happen. Chris and I spent practically the entire day prepping the house for the winter. Chris conditioned the fence with linseed oil (the smell reminded me of my painting studio in college). I spent the day attacking the weeds and pruning.

It was so good to spend the day outside alongside Chris. I had one of those out-of-body experiences where I sat back and thought to myself, “Really? How did I arrive at this perfection?”  The weeds are nowhere close to being conquered, but seeing the progress is so satisfying.

My parents bought a fixer-upper when I was 5. The best way to describe the state of the house as we moved in: it was the dumpiest house in a sweet neighborhood. The previous tennants had 4 large dogs that weren’t house trained and they left about 2 cars worth of car parts in the backyard. It was that house. Mom and dad set us to work. Every free day (weekends and holidays) always started with a pile of yard work. I hated it. HATED IT.

Now I’m beginning to appreciate the work my mom made us do. And I’m starting to enjoy it a little bit. I still hate dealing with the morning glory. I need to find a pretty ground cover that chokes out the noxious weed. We still have a couple of blooms left in our garden, they’re so pretty.

I can’t take any credit for the beauty of the garden this year. It’s all Nikki’s doing. I feel lucky she left us with such a gorgeous starting point.

Before we even thought about buying a house, I asked my mom to help me with a garden. While she was visiting from Charlotte, she and my dad helped me set things up. We weren’t sure if we’d be moving, so she bought me a few felt grow pots. I’ve loved them and the veggies have, too. They did remarkably well in the move!

We’ve had fresh tomatoes, peppers, basil, mint and a couple of armenian cucumbers this summer! It’s been heavenly to have fresh produce. Next year I think I’ll do 3-4 tomato plants and a few more cucumber plants. I can’t get enough of those armenian cucumbers. They’re my favorite.

These peppers were supposed to be sweet yellow peppers, but they’re a pretty purple instead. I’m not sure if they were somehow mixed up with something else, but I’ve enjoyed eating them.

Did you do a garden this year? What are your favorite items to grow?

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