LBP - The Bedroom Lamps

So this "Lost Blog Post" was pretty much a year in the making. Seriously. Lost for a year. Wedding planning pushed this bad boy back so far I almost forgot about it! I redid these lamps in June or July of 2012.

Here we go!

I found these brand new, matching Target overstock lamp bases at Goodwill for $12.99, retailing at Target for around $24.99 (sorry its been a year later and now they are no longer online, this is similar).

Although the lamps were black, I knew a quick coat of spray paint would make them match wherever I finally decided to place them. Final place decided would be our master bedroom.

The Goodwill stickers were on the ceramic base quite well so I used the paint and adhesive remover Goof Off to remove them. You can find it in the paint section of any major home improvement store. Goof Off uses citrus extracts to break down the gunk and it sort of just wrinkles and falls off. A quick wipe with soap and water made it a clean surface to start.

Before painting, I covered the electrical base with a plastic bag and sealed it with painter's tape.

I wrapped the cord as well with painters tape.

I hit the lamps with my Rust-Oleum Ultra Cover 2X Coverage Primer that I've used in various other projects. I love it. It does a great job. I put on two coats just to make sure my coverage was even and there were no operator issues.

With all DIY projects, sometimes you have a little fail. I didn't anticipate how large the over spray would have been with the spray cans and my cords got covered in primer. Oops! From now on, I will always put the cords in a bag as well!

After I added two coats of Rust-Oleum's Painter's Touch Ultra Cover 2X Coverage spray paint in Gloss Warm Yellow. 

Overall, I love the results! I added two lamp shades I already had and they are just perfect accent for reading in bed with the hubs.

I love the warm ambiance they give the room now!

What paint mishaps have you had while DIYing? See another LBP in this photo?

LBP - The Hall Semi-Circle Table

Lost Blog Post - The Hall Semi-Circle Table

I haven't talked much about our house's hallway: 1. Because its a hallway and 2. It is a narrow space and this makes it difficult to design. Luckily...

One of my many Goodwill impulse buys was a small semi-circle table. I found it on a random summer day for $9.99 (as you can tell with the $10 marking so no one tries to rip them off).

The table already has a light cream color with that aged look to it. As of now, I have done nothing to it other than put it up against the wall.

There really was no other way to put furniture in this hallway. It is only 3' wide. So this guy really was perfect. It also doesn't interfere with the way the doors open and close to the bedrooms which also a great functioning plus.

One other thing you might notice, the hallway is painted! When painting the kitchen, I painted the hallway the same Behr's Wheat Bread that went in the living room. I felt the color already was blended around through the living room and dining space, it was easy to take it a little farther and blend the neutral with the bathroom and bedrooms. Not too shabby huh?!

How are you liking the LBPs? I think they tie all those gaps together and you can really see the progression of our place. 

Hangin' Ten in the Kitchen

I've been doing more than my little fingers can type and photograph. First off, let's rewind.  You know from my previous post I was starting to paint the kitchen. I don't know if I was just feeling the Olympic spirit or what but I ended up painting the kitchen and the hallway in a couple of marathon paint sessions. One during swimming and gymnastics events and the other during the Closing Ceremonies. Well I went a little overboard and my paint went throughout the kitchen and down the hall.

Since I have been trying to be a good bride I have become a bad blogger in the process, I am deciding to treat you with a reveal before the process it took to get there. Adoring fans, please forgive me!

Here is our kitchen wearing Behr's Premium with a Satin finish in Surfer (hey, fashion week just happened). Here is a comination photo of both natural and overhead lighting. The color definitely changes with the light. This lighting brings out the green more.

Here is the same photo without the overhead. Looks way more blue.

One thing that I really noticed was our white backsplash really pops out now. It is not longer just blending in with the wall. We just got a new The Tile Shop up the road, might have to do some scoping for some backsplashes. When I finally paint the cabinets white (shade of white still TBD) the backsplash will fade back in and we don't want that!

Our eat-in dining room looks way more inviting now. I'm really going to have to get on refinishing the table.

Also, now that the door to the door to the garage is featured more, we will have to paint that to make it blend well. Anyone got suggestions for interior door paint? I don't want it the same as the all white hallway doors but I don't want it to be an eyesore either. Please suggestions welcome!

Here is the overall view from the eat-in to get more of the full scope of the space. I do plan on painting the island cabinets the same Surfer color and we plan to switch up the counter tops. The laminite is just not our style, butcher block maybe?

The other wall I painted was the backside wall that joined the kitchen with the living room. Using Behr's Premium paint in my favorite neutral wall color, Wheat Bread in a Satin finish, I made the spaces cohesive and kept the flow going.

The last area I painted with Surfer was the other side of that adjoining wall in the kitchen.

I have one more painting project I left out of this story, but I will leave that for another day. I will say that I think the kitchen is my new favorite room. It makes me happy to be in and I can't wait for the other projects because its only going to make the space more inviting.

I know I won't be posting in the next 3 weeks. I apologize for that but you will have plenty of fun things to read after that. I won't be able to stop myself from writing with excitement. In two weeks we will "officially" be The Anderson Family! Max and I are taking an eight day trip to Negril, Jamaica to sip on rum drinks and Red Stripe and enjoy our new wedded bliss.

Leave us lots of love!

If you want to read more about our journey to the alter, check out my guest blogging gig at The Budget Savvy Bride.

Catching Some Waves

I may have cracked. I feel like wedding planning has taken over my life and I needed to take it back. I've had so many little things go wrong in the last week or so I was just like AHHHH. I decide to take a break and go back to the one thing I know I have control of, this little house.

After work on Tuesday, I went and bought some test pots of paint from Home Depot to finally start work on our kitchen after 15 months of living here. I knew I wanted a Tealish color but I also knew I had to match the colors of the living room the make sure the flowing space was cohesive. I held up the previous paint swatches of the wall colors we already have, Behr's Wheat Bread and Glidden's Cool Cobalt, in the store and these were the closest matches I could find. I chose two of Behr's colors Teal Zeal and Surfer. Teal Zeal  (left) was a little bit darker and more dramatic. Surfer (right) was a little more light and airy.

If you are a little apprehensive about a color for a room, Behr's website you can virtually "paint" any room by upload photos of the space. It's an easy way to try out some colors before you head to the store. I like to jump in with the test pots, but to each their own.

As soon as the colors of the test pots had dried, it was almost a no-brainer that Surfer was the obvious choice.

I painted the test spots in different areas of the room to get different angles of how the light would look with the color and with the colors already established. Not too shabby.

I bought a gallon and a quart Behr Premium paint with the paint and primer combined in the satin finish to ensure I had enough for basically two rooms. After using it the last time in the living room, it have been by far my favorite paint. The coverage is really great and I only have to spot paint after it dries for the few places that got missed by the roller.

The dining area had the most wall coverage and the kitchen not quite a much with all the cabinet space. I also wanted to have enough to paint the cabinetry of the island the same color to make a bold statement. I also bought a gallon of Wheat Bread in satin finish as paint the adjoining wall that goes from the living room in to the dining area. The backside of this wall, sorry I have no photo of the wall from before.

I foresee the cutting in taking the longest for this project since there isn't a ton of wall space to actually roll with the roller. Just a ton of angles and corners in the space. We shall see!

Fun With Fabric

May has already been kicking my butt. I haven't been this busy since my sorority days in college. Four Weddings and A Funeral? Well I have two weddings, two Brewers baseball games, one Incubus concert, one charity walk, one family reunion, possible tooth removal and our engagement photos...all while we are still trying to fix up the house, oh and did I mention we are still planning our wedding?!

I have been squirreling away frames I see from Goodwill, Salvation Army and the Dollar Tree to finally start getting things on the walls. They did not need to match though. Little paint can fix just about anything.

I first used my trusty Rust-Oleum Ultra Cover Primer and primed each surface of the frames.

I made sure to get into every crevice of the surfaces to ensure proper paint adhesion.

I then went back with Rust-Oleum white paint in a satin finish. Using a couple of coats for proper coverage.

Ten newly ready frames for my artistic creativity and photos to be added!

So back to the title of this post "Fun With Fabric". Many of the frames I bought were new and many came with white matching pre-cut mats.

Using one of the pre-matted frames, I used a bold printed piece of fabric I picked up at JoAnn Fabrics for about $3 and (after ironing the fabric first) cut the fabric to size. I used those awkward  family print that comes with the frame as my guide. 

Since it came with the mat, I just framed the printed fabric.

And since you all know by now I have a dirty love affair with striped prints, I did the same with a navy and cream using a little Dollar Tree pre-matted frame. Total cost of these projects with frames was about $11.

After working so crazily hard on making our walls smooth and hole free, I had a hard time putting nails back in them. I headed over to Lowe's and picked up a bunch of 3M Command hangers to prevent my possible indecisiveness from later having to re-repair the walls, again.

I hung them with my homemade fabric artwork from here above our couch in the living room. I apologize for the photo, I best lighting doesn't always give the greatest non-reflective glare of our front lawn.

So what do you think!? Not to shabby huh? I might add a few more things when I finally get some nice end tables in here. All in do time though.

Make Me Some "Wheat Bread"

OK so it's not real wheat bread but Behr's "Wheat Bread" paint. Amazing color. I've said it again and again, but I'm just so amazed. And after Googling it, apparently Wheat Bread is a very popular color.

I used the Behr Premium Plus Ultra brand with the paint and primer in one. I was really getting sick of having to prime before painting and after the guest bedroom debacle from here and here, anything that skipped a step, was fine by me.

So glad I did! The living room walls only took two coats and the second was not very labor intensive. For future painting, I'm definitely keeping up with paint and primer in one.

Here is our finished painting project at night. See how it tones down the harsh blue on the walls.

The neutral color gives a great canvas for the bright accent colors of the pillows and future artwork (its coming so soon!)

Here is a better look of the gray/blue combo.

A day time shot. This is the truest look of the coloring. You can also still see the last of the many ceiling hooks left by the previous owner. They either loved hanging lamps or macrame hanging plants. I am hardcore picturing the plants. 

What do you think? Is gray the new neutral? Do you wish we'd bring back the macrame? Starting to see the bigger picture?

3 Easy Painting Tips

With the ceiling crack taken care of, it was time to paint the rest of living room walls. Finally. It seems way overdue. I mean, we've only lived here nine months and we spend a lot of time in there.

Also after nine months and this was going to be my sixth room being painted, I was really starting to get the hang of this whole painting thing. I wanted to share some things I've learned thus far.

1. Proper floor cover is essential. I even learned how to get around awkward corners from Ellen, Max's mom. First take a sheet of industrial paper and fold it flush against the wall's surface.

Cut the paper evenly with the wall.

Fold the outlining areas of paper down.

With the middle section of paper, fold it under the main piece creating the "cutout".

Now you have a flush, easy way to paint around a bump out wall.

2. Waiting to put that second/third coat of paint on? Use two plastic store bags to tightly wrap around your roller and keep the moisture of the paint sealed in. This way you don't have to wash the roller in between coats. Only do this if you are going to paint again within a day.

3. Cutting in with a trim brush is way easier than using a rolling trim tool. The one we use from Shur-Line is small to fit easily in your hand. The bristles on the outside edges are beveled so that the paint along the ceiling or wall seams gets in there just perfectly.

I am definitely not a professional by any means but each room does seem to be getting easier to paint. Here you can also tell how awesome Behr's Wheat Bread is going to look when its done...