Random Updates

1. For Valentines Day Hubby made me chocolate covered strawberries. I am kind of the devil in the morning, as I have previously noted, so I was grumpy when he woke up at 6:15 am and grumpier as he tried to find clothes. I'm almost certain I expressed said grumpiness. A couple hours later as I was beginning to stir, I yelled at him for still being home. In my world, I sleep until the absolute last moment I can, having factored in the exact time it will take to shower, make food, etc and get to work so I don't understand how he gets out of bed only to be awake at the house! Turns out on this morning he was downstairs hand dipping fruit for me to wake up to. So cute!
2. I pulled off my Valentines Day gift, too. I don't have any pictures right now and my finished product is nowhere near as picture worthy as the one on the original blog I found the idea on but I was still proud. The original idea included sanding the cards to make them look vintage, which I skipped. It also included printing the reasons you love the person (and I figured out the 52 reasons were not for the weeks of the year but for the cards in the deck) out on cardstock via an excel spreasheet or something. I also skipped that because it's not my skillset or style. So I bough name tag badges and stuck them on the cards and hand wrote my reasons. Problem is the name tags came in sets of 25 so I could only write up 50 reasons (it wasn't just that I didn't want to buy the third pack of nametags; they were out! I swear!). I ended up having to go to 2 different stores to get my single hole puncher and my book rings, both of which were like 4 times the cost at Office Max, where I ended up, than they were at Target, which was sold out. My hand really started to hurt from all that punching but I was so excited to share my 50 reasons that I busted through it.
3. I randomly found a West Elm store in my area...the place that sells the antlers. I feel really lucky to have seen them in person because it answered any lingering questions. The larger ones look really cool but the smaller ones, aka anything less than like $75, looked weak. And they felt weak. Like if I dropped them they might disintegrate.
4. Having not given a book update in a while, I can say that's because I haven't been wowed lately. I just finished Matched and Crossed. They were really hyped up and I'm just not sure why. They feel a lot more focused on the romance than the dystopian society. I liked them but they weren't the kinds of books that make you want to cancel plans to keep reading.
That's it for updates today!

Wacky or Wonderful?

You be the judge....is this wacky or wonderful?
Pros: Antlers are huge right now. Funky. Interesting. I have had a window with these paper mache sets from West Elm up on my computer for days so I must really need them.
Cons: They are expensive. While I would like to splurge and get a clear animal shape, the only real options I would allow myself are the small set for about $20 or the medium indistinct one (in the middle of the pic) for about $30. Also, I'm not I have any space cool enough to house them. But isn't that why I need them? To change the coolness factor?
Here are some more shots to inform your decision...

And the Old shall become New again

I'm in home decorating mode. I generally vacillate between living in this mode and travel mode. Since I have a trip booked for next month and the newest issue of HGTV magazine arrived in my mailbox over the weekend, it only makes sense that I am thinking of new ways to make the house look nicer.

Subscription infor here!

While I am trying to slow down and savor the magazine, one of the pieces I have gotten to featured an old rotary dail phone on the wall. It looked really cool and I was thinking I was in need of one of these. As an aside, did you know that if you have a landline phone and dial 911, even if you don't say anything/aren't able to, it goes to your local police and they will come out to check on you. That's a really helpful safety tip and we pay for a land line but don't have a phone connected because we live off our cell phones. So that is part of the thinking behind my need for a cute phone in addition to its simple cuteness. One of the things I love about this magazine is that they don't just show you pretty pictures, they give you the specifics on where to find the items, what the paint color names are, etc.

So this phone was located at www.oldphones.com. I went to check things out and found this. A rotary phone, like the one I grew up with on my parents kitchen wall, will now cost you about $100!! Whaaaaaaaaat! It makes me think those Storage Wars guys are right and that my dad is a smarter guy than I give him credit for by saving absolutely everything under the sun. Come to think of it, they probably have their old rotary phone in a pile in the basement somewhere!

Color me green with envy

I'm pretty sure when I painted my bathroom bright yellow and fell knee deep in the can that I swore not to do my own painting again. Despite my vow, impulse got the better of me and while I was at Lowe's using my handy 10% off coupon for a new water heater, I picked up some Lime Green paint and my first drop cloth ever and went to town on the laundry room. Thank goodness for the drop cloth because this was also my first time paining in a room with carpeting. Carpeting that is less than a week old, I might add. 

The laundry room is a pretty small space in the basement with two drywall walls and one cement wall. The fourth "wall" is the under the stairs storage, corner with the to-be-replaced water heater, kitty litter, etc. so it barely bears mentioning. Because the space is small and because the room is entirely my zone as I do the laundry, scoop the litter and keep my food storage shelved in there, too, I got to do whatever I wanted with it. And I have always dreamed of bright lime green walls somewhere in my life. This was a great color for this space because the bottom of the drywall had some water stains from the pipe bursting and this color covered those perfectly. This was also a room for this color because it has a lot of flavor and I don't think a larger/4 walled room could handle all its goodness.


So the laundry room might currently be my favorite space in the house. Inspired by the outpouring of personality on the walls, I also tossed up some Michael Jackson posters and a couple Counting Crows and Michael Franti concert flyers. Oh, and a somewhat controversial picture I took at Woodstock '99 that amuses me. And a road sign of my name that a friend "found" for me in high school. It's pretty much wonderful!!! And it's a welcome relief to have the food storage newly organized and back on shelves, as opposed to living on my dining room table like it has been for the last two months while the basement has been in flux. 


I hope you are not pea green with envy...

Settling in and Questions for you

Now that I am going to be settled in at home for the next few months, I hope to finally catch the blog up with fun pictures and tales from my trips this year.
There are also some exciting changes on the home front, as we finally got our new carpet installed in the basement on Monday, after two months with one third of our home unusable. It will be great to get furniture out of the garage and into the new space (and to get my car into the garage again, finally!!....it really stunk to have to clean snow off my car last month; I'm out of practice since the car lived inside most of last year).
Currently, I also have high hopes of doing some painting. This week's new home based challenge is choosing a new water heater and who will install it. Not decorative, I know, but it's the reality of being a home owner and it does offer some interesting tax rebate opportunities as we become more energy efficient. Does anyone have experience with purchasing water heaters out there? Does an energy efficient heater = shorter showers because we will run out of hot water faster? And I'm debating hiring a plumber vs using Lowe's for istallation. The plumber was very nice but almost $400 more expensive. Lowe's has a couple of cons on the list but plenty of pros, as well.
And finally, I am also interested in merging my travel life into my home life. How do I aim to do this? I'm going to hang a hammock!!!!! It's so symbolic to me of relaxation (and I helped the hammock man in Costa Rica weave part of one, which was really cool). Not being the most spatially inclined person, I am a bit overwhelmed by the finding of studs in a condo basement to secure my hooks into. And if I am unable to hang the hammock in the basement as I dreamed of, where else can a hammock live inside? PS, Hubby told me to hang it in the garage. Really?? Am I really going to hang next to my car in the freezing cold reading a book? Now you probably understand why I take girl trips:)

Etsy Mania and a Collage Wall

I love Etsy. I am frequently shocked that more people don't know about it when I mention it. Basically, it's a website that is filled with individual "stores" but all the items are hand made crafts. There is a huge variety available and the range of talent out there is astounding! This would be a great place to both plug a friend and give an example: One of my friends I have trained for triathlons with creates gorgeous jewelry and sells it on Etsy at http://www.etsy.com/shop/whimsydesigngirl.
In the throws of one of my Etsy binges, I decided to take a cue from my favorite home design blog, Young House Love, and assemble a collage wall.
As you can see, on my wall I included some prints and other items from Etsy, featured below, as well as some funky patterns in the same color scheme to frame personal pictures. There's a shout out to each of the cats up there because if other people can put baby pictures of their kids on a wall, why can't I put baby pictures of my cats up? I also found a picture from one of my favorite performers, Michael Franti, on facebook and ordered through Kodak Gallery. One of my favorite additions is a set of mini silver frames that has pictures of my hubby as a kid, representing different holidays: him in a pumpkin patch, him in a pilgrim hat, him dressed as a wise man=precious! And finally, I tossed in a few couple shots, one printed in black and white and one in color. Combined, this wall feels both personal and artistic in a fun presentation.

See the Sassy Side Table hanging out in the corner?????? For my collage wall, I stuck with a mostly black and white or silver frame theme. Because the accent color in the room is such a bright color, turquoise, I didn't want to overwhelm the wall with too much color, too. You see splashes of the accent color along with the patterned black and white frames. However, collage walls are a great way to infuse color into an otherwise neutral room, too. Just choose photos, cd jackets, fabric, and other items that have big pops of color to liven things up.

This print comes from http://www.etsy.com/shop/thewheatfield. I love this quote by Ralph Waldo Emerson, a New Englander who, in my mind, was thinking of my favorite beachy spots in Maine when he came up with this gem.

This clock hails from http://www.etsy.com/shop/makingtimetc. The shop owner uses plates to create clocks and a lot of funky colors and patterns.

I actually snagged this at a flea market in Vermont a few years ago for $5. People don't think of it often but most couples portrayed whether in art or even on greeting cards are the same race. Being married to someone with a different skin tone makes it hard to find visual representations of our coupledom. I liked this piece of art because the couple are racially ambiguous; I mean neither of us are yellow and orange so it all works out!

Finally, this piece is actually another $5 find. I got this at the Christmas Tree Shoppe and it's a wood canvas. The room has a sub theme of birds and trees or birds IN trees so this fell in line with that.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sassy Side Table

 

Since the blue paint on the bookcase went over well last week, I thought today I would share what I did with the rest of that blue paint. As mentioned in my last post, the whole point of the blue paint on the bookcase was to add some color to a bland room. A bland room that also needed a side table next to the bed. So I went to Savers, which if you don't have these near you (they are new in my area) is kind of like a Salvation Army store. It's filled with donated, second-hand items at cheap prices. The table above is part of a set of TV tables that was missing one. I was able to score it for $3!!

It started out as black wood.

For $3, I figured I could experiment and if the result was icky, I wasn't really at a loss. So I slapped some of the blue bookcase pant on the legs of the table!

I had purchased some mod podge a while back  that I intended to used on a mini bookcase turned tv stand in the basement but I never got to it. (I still may.....). The plan for the tv stand was applied to the side table. As a person who keeps a journal and saves mementos as part of that history, I have all sorts of pictures, race bibs, you-name-it laying around. I pulled together a medley of these items to personalize the table and put these things on display. The items I chose included the following: A card a magician had signed with my name on one of our cruises, the cd from our wedding that was given out as a favor, a picture of Pat with a snake around his neck from a stop on our honeymoon, a race bib from the triathlon I am most proud of completing, a bunch of quotes and stickers, a letter for our last name, a room key from our honeymoon cruise, a bumper sticker from when I hiked Mt. Washington, a decal from the school I graduated from, and some pretty scraps of magazine clippings of brightly colored comforters I am not going to buy.

 

 

 

It takes a few coats and looks white and lumpy at first. It is definitely sticky and that's part of the point. However, it did crumple some of the paper items in the process and they had to be removed. It also starts out wet so it created some wrinkles in things I thought would be smooth. I guess that's part of the personal character now!

When it finally dries, it's a glassy, clear coating that seals all the items in place like a lacquer. You can see that the painted legs work really well with the comforter.

A few practical and colorful accessories later and it functions as a real side table!

And there it is, all happily completed! The rest of the clutter is another blog post.....let's just say the pictures are now on the wall, as are the little mystery squares sitting on the pillows. To be continued.....

Don't want to paint the whole room? How about the bookcase?

So last week I gave an intro to my home so I could start posting about some of the projects I have or want to undertake there and it wouldn't be coming out of left field. Then work got really busy and I forgot to post ANYTHING. Sorry about that! 
This project is one of my favorites because I love the bright color involved. Most of our walls are painted with very neutral, bland colors ala HGTV's "Designed to Sell". The idea is that buyers want to be able to picture themselves in the space you are selling so you want the colors to be kind of ho-hum, nothing striking that really screams "you".
The challenge is that once you move in, you either have to settle into your neutral, adaptable colors or you have to do a lot of painting. I had never painted prior to moving into this home and I fell into the paint can when I painted my bathroom this very lovely shade of yellow. As a result, a lot of our walls have remained blank canvases and I have tried to add color through furniture, art and accessories. 
Inspired by the amazing blog Young House Love and some creative pictures from Pinterest, I decided to infuse some color into our guest room by painting the backdrop of the built in bookcase (which had been painted to match the tan walls-not by me, by the way).

This is the color I chose because it so closely matched the comforter of the bed.

I loved this comforter so much that, even though I was trying to be fiscally responsible and not buy unnecessary bedding, I kept thinking about it and had to run back to the store to make it mine. It's just so cheery!! And I like the pattern a lot, too.

Voila! Here is Picture #1 bland bookcase reinvented with turquoise paint. I love that it's just the backdrop so the color isn't overwhelming; it just pops some goodness out from behind the books.

The bottom line: It was easy and quick and fun. Now, this otherwise dreary space has some excitement and it's one of my favorite features...maybe in the whole house!

An introduction to Our Home

Kitchen Before

Kitchen After

I have been so swept up in writing about travel lately that I have neglected writing about my blooming domesticity. While it's lovely to leave home briefly to see how other people live, at the end of the day I have a mortgage to pay:) And in making that kind of commitment to a building, I need to show it a little love, too.
Before I can start sharing posts about projects I am undertaking on the home front, I feel it necessary to introduce you to the history of my home. We moved into our townhouse in June of 2009, just over 2 years ago now. Of note, this was after living at a boarding high school for two years with about 25 teenage girls. During that time, we lived in the tiniest apartment on campus. The schedule and responsibility that came with our living arrangement paired with the tax rebates being offered for first time home owners made for a perfect storm to start a housing search.
 We chose the area we settled in for a number of reasons. Admittedly, the primary reason was that I wanted to be closer to my family and farther away from work. Although the commute is sometimes challenging, it's nice to be able to have the separation for both physical and emotional safety; I never run into clients I work with at the grocery store. While we may have preferred to be a tiny bit closer to work, all of the towns between the city we work in and the town my parents live in and I adore are big ticket towns. We either couldn't afford anything there or we could afford smaller, more run down places that would need more work. Therefore, a 45 minute commute was a compromise to have 1600 square feet, three levels of living, two bedrooms, two bathrooms, a finished basement and an attached garage. In the MetroBoston area, that's a decent amount of space for folks not working with huge cash flows.
Our upgrades began in the kitchen. It looked old and had some drawers that couldn't even open due to the layout. There was also a stenciled/painted ivy motif near one of the windows which, I hope goes without saying, had to go! We used the tax refund we got to pay for new cabinets and counters. I found a great deal on Craigslist for stainless steel appliances because not all of the old ones matched the refrigerator was spoiling my milk.
It took until August of 2010 to start thinking about really decorating. Beyond what we brought from the tiny apartment that we tossed up on the walls, we didn't invest in items for the walls or other accessories until I took a week off in the summer. When it rained most of the days I planned to go to the beach, I watched a lot of HGTV and got some ideas and inspiration and ran around to craft stores, department stores, home goods stores, hardware stores, and even book stores to begin to fulfill my vision.
It wasn't until this past Spring that we finally put up curtains in the living room and master bedroom (don't worry, we had blinds so the neighbors weren't getting a front row seat to everything). And it's still a work in process!
Here is what has been done:
kitchen cabinets, counters and appliances
painting accent wall in kitchen, and both bathrooms
removed living room carpet and had laminate flooring installed
food storage area in laundry room created
window treatments in both bedrooms and living room
basic wall decor and accessories in both bedrooms and living room
Here's my wishlist to do:
new bathroom vanities
more pops of color
repaint kitchen
paint dining room accent wall
new faucets
new shower head
greater development of style vision in both bedrooms and living room
clean the garage out (we still have the original stove in there)
pull together the basement man cave/sports and movies room
paint stairwell banisters (they just started peeling!)
at least one piece of customized art
remove caulking from tub

I'm sure there are more projects but my brain just flooded.......