Spring Break

Couldn't you just dance? Couldn't you just kiss the ground? Couldn't you just cry tears of joy? I certainly could - because spring is officially HERE! For me, it has been the longest winter, and honestly, I'm having to check my calendar twice to make sure that it really is over!

Tomorrow begins spring break for my girls and I'm not going to spend all my time working on projects (though I'm chomping it to bits to get things done...). We did buy them new twin mattresses earlier in the week and I've been trying to spruce their room up a bit to ease them into the change. You see, they've shared a bed since they were very little, so now having their own bed is a really big deal. They actually cried themselves to sleep the night we ordered the mattresses, not because they would miss sleeping with each other, but because the idea of throwing out their old mattress just devastated them. They begged and pleaded with me to at least keep the mattress in the garage or the attic. They left protest notes. They called their daddy Mr. Bologna (I don't know why), and they said they were on strike against their new mattresses and would not sleep on them unless the old mattress was stored somewhere in the house.

I felt for them, I really did. But I held my ground. The old mattress must go, much like our old van that died last year. I told them I loved that old van - the one we bought when they were babies and held so many memories, the one we had to replace no matter how much I loved it, the one that made me cry when I even thought about replacing it, even long before it finally keeled over. Change is hard. But realizing that our memories are kept within our minds and hearts and not within 'things' helps. So the old mattress was hauled off on Wednesday and replaced with two new twins. And the girls were excited, though they were sure to tell me that they "still missed their old mattress".

On Monday, I spent the day painting their room a pretty shade of purple - the color they both agreed on. It was a surprise for them when they got home from school and they actually began to get excited about the changes. I also primed their bookshelf and french provencal dresser in preparation for a white coat of paint or two that hubs will be working on later today. We're hoping to have it finished by the time they have their sleep over this upcoming weekend. This bedroom spruce up wasn't on my current mile long project list (goodness knows I have too much going on to begin with), but sometimes you just have to drop everything and change directions, as parents especially know.

Here is a before photo of the dresser. This is the picture pulled from the Craigslist ad where I bought it and isn't my photo - I apologize that it's so small. But hopefully you can tell that it is really sweet. It's solid wood and perfect for a little girls room. There is just something so fresh about white against light purple.

I may be scarce for the next week or so (as I have been for the last week or so) because I have some fun things planned for the girls next week and I'm also trying to make sure some important things get finished before the sleepover.

I hope everyone is enjoying springs arrival as much as I am and we'll see you soon!

P.S. The photo above was taken on the last day of winter...time to put away my signature wool hat till next year and get out the sunglasses and sandals! Spring is here - and change is good!

A Cottage Chair Makeover Story: Yes, You *Can* Paint Fabric!

Edited to add: The discussion forum where I originally found the instructions for this project was on the HGTV website. The instructions have recently been brought up in the forum again and can be found here. I basically followed these instructions with the exception of using paste wax as the final step.

In your thrifting adventures, have you ever run across a perfectly well formed, good boned, sturdy upholstered piece at a great price...but you didn't buy it? Was it because you didn't like the upholstery and you thought you didn't have the skills to reupholster it yourself? Or maybe you knew it wasn't yet in your budget to higher a professional to do it for you?

Here is an alternative that can work for some low nap fabric: Paint it! Yes, you really can! And you don't have to purchase those expensive upholstery spray paints that come in limited colors, either. Just use a brush and a can of paint in whatever color you like.

I found four of the chairs above at Goodwill a couple of years ago. Obviously, they were from the 70's. (They came with the small, sturdy but beaten up dining room table that I turned into a large coffee table). I paid just $20 for the table and four chairs! I loved the form of the chairs but hated the color of the cushions. Originally, it didn't even occur to me to paint them and so I just stuck the chairs in the garage until I could figure out what to do. Then I came across a discussion in a decorating forum and someone there had actually painted their entire sofa. It looked great...it looked like leather! I was inspired and thought that if someone can paint their whole sofa, then I could try painting my chair cushions. If it didn't work out, I could always recover them down the road - and anything would be better than harvest gold, right?

The original fabric was velour, I do believe. (I am challenged when it comes to knowing fabric types so I apologize if there is another name for this.) As I mentioned, smooth, low nap fabrics work best for this project.



I made sure that the fabric was clean and dry before I began. Then, with a brush and a can of interior latex satin paint (Olympic Premium, "Dark Granite" is the name of the color I used), I started painting. I started with the edges, making sure I pulled back the decorative cording on the cushion so that I could paint in the the grooves. The first coat probably won't cover well and will look absolutely hideous. If you try this, you will want to throw out your furniture project at this point. Ah, but please don't! It gets better!

I let the first coat dry completely. It took a few days because the first coat really gets absorbed into the fabric. When it was completely dry, I sanded it well with fine sandpaper. This step is necessary because the paint raises the fibers in the fabric and it will feel rough to the touch. I sanded the fabric smooth, wiped it down, and then applied my second coat. It was the same process...I let it dry for a few days and then sanded and repeated. I believe I painted a total of four coats. The final coat did not require sanding because the fabric was completely sealed by the first layers of paint and no longer was rough to the touch.



The result was a chair cushion that looked like soft vinyl or leather. This "finish" can be cleaned easily. Just wipe it with a damp cloth!



Or you can bring it up a notch and even stencil something pretty on the seat. I didn't but I just might in the future. I think it would look great! The photo below shows the nice, soft sheen that a satin paint finish produces.



I painted the rest of the chair as well. I "distressed" it by gently brushing some of the edges of the chair with brown paint. Since this chair was photographed a few weeks ago, I've repainted the frame in a solid white as I decided I wanted it to look a little less distressed. I believe my reasoning behind brushing on the brown paint on the edges was to paint over it again with white and then sand back down lightly to the dark brown. But solid white looks just fine. This chair and another just like it will go in my craft studio.



While I don't think I'd be brave enough to paint an entire couch, I'm glad that attempted chair cushions at least. To me, they look a so much better! And we have more room in our garage now!

Sadly, my memory card for my camera just died yesterday. I had a camera full of "before" photos of various studio accessories. And the photos of my youngest child's first missing top tooth :( Hopefully we'll get a new card soon so that I can share the other projects I've been working on. Until then, I'll let you know that my farm style craft table is completed and ready to prime and paint - hubs did a fabulous job! The steps in the studio are also painted a deep chocolate brown and just need a little touch up work. I have another table that I need to start sanding in preparation for paint as well. Three more major pieces of furniture for my studio need to be built and/or made over: a large L-shaped unit, the shelving unit that will sit on top of it, and the makeover piece is a large cubby style system. So much to do, but I will be thrilled to finally have my own space to create!

Craft Studio Progress

I snapped a few shots of my craft room today. Not a ton of progress made in here since the beginning of the year but it's looking a lot better than the before. I'm still loving the robin's egg blue and have found a few ways to incorporate into other parts of the house. LOVING it with RED and WHITE and BROWN!

The little blue thing that you see there near the ceiling at the windows is a snowflake left over from the party, lol. I need to get the big ladder in and take it down. I didn't think to put the switchplate covers back on until *after* I took the photos, either. :)






That old vent needs to be replaced or repainted. At some point, I hope to have a large, tall cubby/shelving unit right there to hold supplies and inventory. We have something like that in the garage and it's so ugly (bright yellow!) but solid wood and very spacious. I'm thinking about adding molding and trim and additional shelving to it as the current cubby holes are very large and could be divided into halves or even thirds. With a beadboard back and then painted out in a fresh, bright white, I think it could be beautiful piece, though. The problem is that it now holds and organizes a lot of things for us in the garage. I would have to do some shuffling and rearranging, for sure.



My project for this week will be painting the stoop and stair treads a deep chocolate brown. The stair faces will be white.



Here is the craft table hubs is working on for me. It needs a little more trim and maybe a wooden applique on the front of the skirt (kind of like what we are putting on our doors, except a little bigger). I will be painting the craft table white and have a glass top to go on it for easy cleanup.



I will be sure to share photos when the steps are completed. I'm excited about chocolate brown and hope it looks as good on the steps as it does in my head!

Cottage Studio Ceiling Makeover Completed

First I'd like to thank all of you who stopped in and supported my blog sale last week! Your items have either already arrived or are due to arrive any day now. You may not realize it, but you've helped me take another step in accomplishing my business goals. Thank you so much!

Now, about that studio... We've actually been finished with the ceiling and walls for a little while now. We painted the walls a nice robin's egg blue and added additional trimwork to the steps. I still have a bunch of junk that I need to move out of the space before I can get some good photos of the entire studio so far, but I did snap a few shots of the ceiling. If you remember, we once had old skylights that were removed when we replaced our roof. This left four ugly plywood holes in the ceiling and I wasn't sure how I could make them look attractive until we could afford to redo the entire ceiling someday down the road. We also had a very ugly (and dusty!) ceiling fan and a couple of equally ugly lights that needed to be addressed. Replacing them was not an option because as usual, our budget is so tiny it's practically nonexistent:)

So here is the studio ceilng "BEFORE"....






And here it is "AFTER"....

(Click photos below to enlarge)






Despite the challenges and limitations, I think the ceiling makeover turned out pretty well! Hubs did a great job turning those plywood holes into "windows", didn't he? I painted a subtle sky background and used a stencil to add my sparrow. As for the light and fan makeover, thank goodness for my trusty brown camouflage paint! With a matte clear coat, they look like oil rubbed bronze fixtures! I did another fan makeover in my living room about three years ago with a different type of oil based paint, and let me tell you, what I used this time around was MUCH easier and faster! (I have a little bird - my Ginger - on my shoulder right now or else I'd go to the garage and check the spray can, but I believe it's either Rustoleum or Krylon brown camouflage paint. I got mine at Wal-Mart.)

Hubs has already built one of my craft tables. It just needs a few pieces of trim and it's ready to paint. It's got a tongue and groove pine top and is very farmhouse in style. Here is a shot of the table top before he put it all together. He cut the "tongue" part off and will add trim around the perimeter side edge of the tabletop. I thought about some kind of rope moulding but I think I'll probably just stick with plain, flat trim to keep the look simple. I have a glass top to go right on top for easy cleanup as I'm a very messy crafter. I look forward to being able to see our dining room table again because that's where all of my stuff has been for weeks!



I hope everyone is staying warm! We started using our fireplace this week and it's never been more welcomed!

"Home" + An Easy Painted Word Project for Word Lovers

Home. Such a special place, or at least it should be. A place to leave your worries at the door, a place to relax, a place to love and to be loved. I suppose in a perfect world, every home would be free from tension and squabbles between it's members, but in reality, it exists at times if we aren't careful, especially when there are growing children who are finding and exerting their own independence and opinions. It seems that I'm constantly reminding my girls that though they may witness name calling, cattiness, disrespect, and unkindness at school and elsewhere, they are to never pick it up and bring it home with them. It tries to seep in daily, of course, but I hope that one thing that my kids remember when they leave home years from now is that they were never allowed to hurt each other with their words or actions, and whenever they did, they were corrected with consequences if necessary. I am just now reminded of a piece that I saw on Good Morning America yesterday. It was about a video uploaded on YouTube by a father who taped his toddlers hitting each other - while he encouraged them all the while.

We may not be able to prevent others from treating us unkindly elsewhere, but at home, we need to know that we are special, loved, needed, and respected. Don't we all need to know that we can always come back to a haven of peace and rest and security- our home - and that of the very few things that we can count on in life, we can at least count on that?!!!

Speaking of home, I wanted to share with all you word lovers a fairly easy project. You've seen Wallwords and Wonderful Graffiti, nifty sites where you can custom order vinyl letters, words, and phrases for any surface of your home...and I love the idea! Someday, I'm going to put in an order:) Until then, here's a great way to get the same look for pennies (and we're trying to save every one of those!). I found this technique many moons ago from another site but I don't remember where. If it looks familiar, please send me the link!

For this project, all you need to do is print out a word, phrase, or even an image in an a nice font. For the word that I used, HOME, I enlarged my font size to 400 in Microsoft Word. I cut off the excess paper and positioned it where I wanted it and marked the position lightly with a pencil. In my case, I chose our fireplace surround. It just needed something...But you might choose a wall, a piece of furniture, or just about anything paint will stick to.



Next, I colored the back of my printed word with a crayon. You'll want to color nice and hard and make sure you cover all of (the back of) the word. This coloring will serve the same purpose as carbon paper, really.



After I colored like crazy, I positioned my word on my our fireplace surround again, lining it up with the marks I made earlier. I taped it securely on all four sides, but I found that I ended up taking the tape on the bottom off so that I could lift the paper and see my progress as I worked. With a pencil, I traced my word with quite a lot of pressure. I actually had to trace twice because of the heavy texture on the surround. It helps to trace with an up-down motion (or side to side, depending on the direction you are tracing)...make a stroke up, retrace your stroke back down, then go up again, and so on.



When my tracing was complete, I removed my paper word template and with a very, very stiff, angled brush, I began to fill in with brown paint. This was a little tricky, but I took it really slow and used a tooth pick to "paint" in the hard to reach areas, and a toothpick with a wet tip to clean up any mistakes.



It's not exactly like the word I printed as I added a little more flourish to the H (not on purpose, though!) but it came out pretty well for my first try.



And finally, here is the finished look. I think I found the something I was looking for!



If you try this, please let me know - I'd love to see your project!

(Just want to add, I am not left handed as it appears in the photos. I needed my right hand to hold the camera and just "posed" with my left hand so you could get the idea...I can't imagine how this project would have turned out if tried using my left hand for real!)

Who I Haven't Forgotten...

You, dear readers. Though I'm sure you may have thought that I had.

For those that have followed my blog for years or have blogs of your own, you know that sometimes this happens - this business of going for weeks without a single update.

In my excitement over my studio room redo and my just knowing that at least this project would be quick and painless and over with in no time flat, I failed to remember that it would take an act of the Almighty for us to work through any remodeling plans in a timely manner and without a hitch. Can I just say that hubs and I have had many serious "discussions" over the s l o w progress of our cottage in the making. We seem to have two different views, many times, of how quickly a project should move along. Between real work and life, the reality is that maybe in a months time, five to eight hours may be dedicated to a project. So this is my reality and it has been since we've moved here. I think had I known this is the way it would be, I would have been content to live in our regular 70's made ranch just the way it was. But who knows...maybe when we are finally finished, I'll be glad that we struggled through each and every project, large and small. Maybe I'll say..."It was all worth it." Maybe I'll say that it was ok that we lived with a gutted bathroom for five years because once we finally finished, it was all that I could have ever wished for. Maybe I'll be glad that we lived for years without any real flooring as our beautiful hardwood sat untouched in the garage while we finished up the "dirty work" inside. Just know that right now I am extremely envious of all of you who are able to complete remodeling project from start to finish in a reasonable amount of time. You have my undying admiration! We, however, are not one of those types of people.

So in my disappointment and discouragement, I couldn't bear to write and update my blog. I hope that you have been there or at least understand.

We had to paint the studio three times, of course. I ended up using a custom robin's egg blue that I created myself even before I had painted the swatches you saw in my last post. My color had a bit more green in it and a little less blue - which is what I wanted. We painted the whole room out and needed just one more coat but ran out of paint. But when we had another custom gallon mixed and on the walls, it wasn't the same color as what hubs had already cut in in the corners and along the trim. Soooo....we had to buy another gallon and paint the entire room again. Much better! A couple of weekends hub was out of town, so no real work in the studio took place because I cannot for the life of me paint trim without getting it on the walls. Hubs put the second coat of white trim paint on last weekend, thinking the painting would finally be *done*, but it still needs another coat. Though the steps and stoop have been primed, I'm going to hold off painting them until last because I don't won't hubs work boots marring them up. The fan and lights have been painted for weeks now and I've been dying to have them installed, but I guess I'm going to have to practice patience for a bit longer. I don't want to take photos of the studio so far until they are up and the last of the trim paint is done, but it has turned out nice so far. If you look at one of the photos of the kitchen below, you can get a sneak peak of the studio walls if you look through the french door to the right. Who knew red and robin's egg blue could work so well together?! I'm not going to make predictions on when we'll start building the work stations as hubs has another trip coming up. I just hold my breath and hope that we can begin sometime this month maybe. My plans to officially start my business this year have once again been foiled. Hubs says I should "create product" anyway, but that's not how I work when supplies and stuff are strewn everywhere because they don't have a home and proper organization - and it looks like all my "spare" time needs to be spent on trying to help him work on the room.

I do, however, have photos to share. Just little vignettes I photographed today and recently. I have a new found love of robin's egg blue and have begun collecting and making accessories to use throughout the cottage. Also, I've completed two Wilton cake decorating courses and wanted to share with you the last cake I made for class. I'm making a similar one today for hubs grandmother:)







I made these spools well over a year ago. I love words and old-fashioned style paper, so this was a nice way to bring the two elements together.





I painted the birds with my custom color but the creamer I found at Goodwill - it is my exact blue!



I thought about shooing this moth away before I took this shot, but she was frantically flying about the kitchen lights last night when I was baking some cookies...I was glad to see that she had found a peaceful, safe spot to rest so I left her:)







(This is the photo from which you can see the robin's egg blue studio walls...)






We worked on our cakes in class. We learned the basket weave technique and promptly applied it to our cakes. Mine leaves a lot to be desired, lol! My frosting softened too much as I held the decorating bag in my warm hands, but thank goodness for lots of flowers to cover it up!








Thanks for continuing to stop in and for all the emails and nudges I've received:) Thanks so much!