A Boring Box

So yesterday I shared my plan to inject a little life into our master bedroom.  Today I'm sharing what we are currently working with!  I probably should have done this the other way around, but thats how I roll :)

This is what it looks like from our bedroom door.  With the exception of the gray nightstand and the bed, all of the other furniture came with the house we are renting.  Its not my flavor, but we have to work with it.  The closed door you see is our little bathroom.  I'd love to update that big black and white picture on the left, and maybe put some color on those boring walls.

The wall opposite the bathroom is dominated by sliding glass doors.  They offer a lot of light, but not a lot of options to rearrange furniture.

And this is the view from the bathroom door.  Little man's diaper changing area, and cloth diaper pail, are in our room.  We can move it, but it has just worked well in here!  We'll see what happens as we make little changes :)

Oh and here is the color palette I am working with!  Just the big squares, I couldn't figure out how to get the little complementary squares to go away.  One day I WILL be more tech savvy, just not today :)  The top three colors are the dominant colors, with the two on the bottom row being accents.  I'd love to put that taupe in the upper left corner on the walls!  I picked all of these colors out on the Benjamin Moore Color Capture app.  Its free, and totally awesome!  If you have a smart phone, check it out!

So thats our master bedroom, in all its bland glory!  I can't wait to inject some life into this space!

p.s.  I'm linking up today with A Bowl Full of Lemons.  Check it out!

Feeling Moody

Have you ever been working on a room and thought 'if I could just see the room finished, I'd know where to go from here!'?  Well, I've been trying to make some simple changes to our master bedroom.  My hope is to transform it from a boring white box to something relaxing, with a little bit of luxury and fun thrown in there.  

While I have a vision in my head, and THINK it should turn out looking great, I've been a little bit worried about my final result.  Enter the mood board!  Talk about a simple way to put a couple ideas together on paper, and see if it will truly work.  

And there she blows!  I've centered my theme around the black chevron Nate Berkus bedspread.  My wonderful hubby got it for me a couple months ago and i.love.it.  From there I wanted to add some bling in the form of some bronzy accessories, like the starburst mirror.  I also wanted to step away from the current bland and boring white and black I have going on by tossing in some bright yellow and bold navy.  I love the little geometric pattern on the curtains and pillow, balanced out with the curvy shape of the navy lamp.

Since we don't have a headboard and footboard, I wanted to add a little bench at the end of the bed.  I also love the idea of having two different style side tables.  So, since we currently have the little gray nightstand we redid in our master, I thought the round, wood table would balance it nicely.

I'm sure our master won't turn out looking EXACTLY like this.  But seeing it all together makes me feel more confident moving forward.  And, its nice knowing that if I ever get stuck, I can just refer back to this to help get a clearer picture in my head :)  I'll pop in tomorrow and share some pictures of our current set up, so you can follow the progress as we go along!

So what helps you envision a project your working on?  Are you a pinterest junky?  I know I am  Do you like to tear pictures out of magazines?  Or are you a mood board fan too?  

High Five for Friday!

Another week has flown by!  I hope you and yours had a great week too :)

1.  Have you seen all of the awesome in the Target dollar section right now?  This cost me $3, total!!

2.  Beanie and I shared this for breakfast one morning :)  SOOOO yummy!

3.  Bowling at the incredible Splitsville at Downtown Disney, with my two favorite guys!

4.  Getting our garden on, slowly but surely.

5.  My wonderful hubby got me this coffee cup for Christmas, and I have coffee out of it every.single.morning.  That toothy cheshire grin makes me happy!

So what made you smile this week?  Have a wonderful weekend everyone!

I'm linking up with Lauren over at thelaurenelizabeth.com  :)

A Greener Clean

Happy Wednesday!  Sorry I was MIA earlier in the week.  I had an awesome earth day inspired project planned for this weekend, but then it rained two days in a row.  So, playing in the dirt had to be postponed :)  And now I've been up to my elbows in kleenex since beanie and I came down with colds!  But I'm trying to get back in the swing of things, and I couldn't wait to share this neat little cleaning idea with you!

So for those of you who don't know me well, I really appreciate green.  And not just the color either!  I love trying to find ways to detoxify our home by using green cleaners.  I've been a long time user of Method and Mrs. Meyer's cleaning products, and love them both!  Recently I've been trying to branch out a little though.  There are all these great recipes out there for DIY cleaners, that should really save in the money department too!  DIY+penny saving?!?!  You know that makes me happy!

Here's where I had a little problem though-  I'm kind of a snob about smells!  I know, I should totally get over it, but I like to use things that smell pretty!  Thankfully, both Mrs. Meyers and Method products smell awesome!  Have you sniffed the Method window cleaner?!?!  Minty heaven!

But anywho, for those of you who have seen some of these 'green cleaner recipes', a lot of them call for vinegar.  And, if you've ever opened a bottle of vinegar and taken a wiff, YUCK!  I'm sorry, I know its cheap, and non toxic, and supposedly works wonderfully, but I do NOT want my house to smell like that.

So when I came across this trick to use Dawn dish soap and distilled white vinegar to clean your shower, I almost passed right over it.  But then I decided what the heck, I'll give it a shot!  And I love it!

But before I get ahead of myself, here's how it works:

First, gather your materials.  You'll want one of those heavy duty kitchen scrubbers that lets you put dish soap directly into the handle.  I picked this one up at Target for around $2.  Then, you'll need some distilled white vinegar and some dish soap.  To kick the green factor up a notch, I chose Mrs. Meyer's Clean Day dish soap in Honeysuckle.  Ohmygoodness I LOVE this scent!  Highly recommend it, especially for this project.

Fill your brush about half way up with dish soap.  Excuse the mess in the background, I told you I was up to my eyeballs in kleenex :)

Then fill it the rest of the way with vinegar.  Easy as that!  I was pleasantly surprised that this smells really nice!  I don't know if its just this particular scent of dish soap, but when I use this it doesn't smell like vinegar at all!  It just leaves my shower with a nice clean floral smell :)

Keep this handy little scrubber in the shower.  When you hop in to shower at night, its so easy to just grab the brush and give your already wet walls a quick scrub!  I always hated cleaning the shower, because I felt like my arms would go numb from all the scrubbing it took to truly get them clean.  But when the shower is already steamy and wet, it takes about three minutes flat! 

 

I've been using my wand every 2 or 3 days for about two weeks now, and I'm in love!  I can't imagine cleaning my shower any other way!

So what new cleaning products have you tried out recently?  Anyone else weird about the way cleaning products smell?

High Five for Friday!!

Yay its Friday!  I think that at the end of the week its easy to find yourself tired and longing for the weekend.  And in the midst of that, its easy to forget all of the awesome things that happen during the week.  So, whether its something big, or something small, I think its nice to reflect on five positive things that happened during your week.  Hence High Five for Friday!

1.  Water+sunshine+wildly happy baby=a great time

2.  Vegetables and hummus are my jam right now

3.  I haven't jumped rope in FOREVER, but it was a blast :)

4.  Furry little escape artist, nomming some grass :)

5.  Blueberry waffle monster!  I just want to smooch that sticky purple face!

So how has your week been?  Leave a comment and let me know!

p.s. I'm linking up today with Lauren at http://www.thelaurenelizabeth.com/    

         check it out!

Recharging a Tired Piece

I was excited to try this little update, as it had almost all of the elements I look for in DIY.  It was cheap, easy, and fun.  Did I mention cheap?  Yea, cheap is good.

About four years ago, I bought this red charging station at a Pottery Barn outlet for $25.  It worked really well in our office at the time, fit our color scheme and everything.  But after we moved from North Carolina to Florida, the poor guy sat neglected in our garage.  I brought it in a couple of months ago when I was finally tired of the wires and chargers cluttering our night stands.  And while it is still perfectly functional, the charger just wasn't working with the decor I had in mind for our master bedroom.  

Spray paint to the rescue!  I picked out this green, because I was looking to bring some vibrant pops of color into our current white box of a bedroom.  

But first things first.  Before painting, I made sure to remove the hardware on the front of the drawer.  Just four little philips head screws, and the handle popped right off.

Then it needed a good dusting with a microfiber cloth.  Its a little embarrassing that he was that dusty.

No more dusty bunnies!

Inside of the charger is a power strip that can't be removed, so I needed to protect the cord from any overspray.  I simply wrapped a plastic bag along about a foot of the cord, and secured it with painters tape.

As soon as it was clean and prepped, I jumped right in!  At first the color was looking a little neon, especially with the contrast of the green on the red, but I decided to have faith.

As I finished the first coat, I started to feel better about the color.

Oh a note to the wise, and my future self, maybe wear gloves the next time you spray paint?!  Unless you enjoy having your husband call you the Hulk for the rest of the day.  You won't like me when I'm angry!  Hulk smash!!  Too much?  K I'll stop :)

After the second coat, he was looking even better!  The key with spray paint is thin, even coats.  I tend to be super impatient, and want to just spray to cover my project in one shot.  But I find that doing a thin coat, giving it at least an hour to dry, and coming back to do a second or even third coat, always results in a better finished product.

You can still see a bit of the red peaking through, so a third coat was definitely necessary.

I also painted the door that goes across the back of the charging station, and the front of the drawer.

I didn't bother with the inside of the drawer, since I figure no one is every going to see it.  And, as I mentioned before, I'm super impatient :)

Three coats and bam!  It's now a yummy bright apple green, just liked I hoped!  Not crazy neon, but vibrant and fun for sure.

Back in his home, and ready to charge!  But I only gave this project an 8 out of 10.  Why?  Because he's STICKY!!  The paint is dry, I left it out in the Florida sun for several hours, yet it is still tacky.  I'm baffled!  Its not enough to stop me from using him, and at only $4 for a can of spray paint, this little makeover certainly wasn't a budget buster.  I'm not sure exactly how to fix this problem, but if I come up with a solution, I'll definitely share!  If you know how to stop the stickiness, let me know!

And here is the little white wall it sits in front of.  He is certainly injecting a lot of happy into the room!   I think with some art work and a few accessories, this little nook could be downright snazzy!  Its slowly but surely coming together :)

Anyone else taking a risk in the color department?  Or giving a tired piece a little spray paint makeover?  Please share!

One Night Stand

I know what you were thinking!  Get your mind out of the gutter ;)

This guy has been sitting around our house for, I don't know, a year and a half?  Wow, its painful to admit that thats how long it took me to finally FINALLY give him a makeover.

This nightstand was passed along to me by a friend who no longer needed it.  I thought sure, I can do something cool with that!  And then he sat in my spare room, just being neglected.  Poor thing!

It had some wear and tear, but I really wanted to paint it a fun color, so that didn't bother me.

Oh, and ugly brass hardware.  ::shudder::

First things first, he needed a light sanding.

I didn't sand too deep, just a nice light all over buffing.  I wanted to scuff up the finish so that the paint would stick and stay for the long haul.  A little bit of 320 grit sand paper, and my handy DeWalt sander, and I was off!

A philips head screw driver was all I needed to take the hardware off of the drawers.

And then I stored the pieces inside the drawer, so I wouldn't lose track of them.  I know me, I could have very easily finished the project and then spent 45 minutes trying to remember where I put the dang hardware!!  So, into the drawer it went!

There he is, nekked and lightly sanded all over!

Next I took a dry cloth and just wiped up all the dust.  You always want a nice clean surface to paint on.

The paint color!  This was actually a clearanced test pot I picked up at Lowe's for a dollar, so I don't know the name of it.  But it looked like a nice neutral gray, and the price was right, so I went for it!

I read somewhere recently that you should cover your paint tray in a plastic bag to make cleanup easier.    Whoever came up with that, you are brilliant!  It worked like a charm!  My least favorite part of painting is always the cleanup, but not anymore :)  I used a foam roller for all of the flat surfaces, to help keep my paint nice and smooth.  Then I had an angled brush on hand to help get into all of the little cracks and crevices.

Sooo pretty!  Not too brown, and not too blue.  A perfect neutral gray.

After one thin coat with the foam roller.

You can still see the finish through this first coat, but thats okay.  Keeping it nice and thin, but doing more coats, helps to insure that you don't end up with big globs or drips in your finish.

And this is where I kinda messed up in my picture taking.  But I'm new to this blogging thing, so please excuse my oops!!

 As you can see in the picture above, this nightstand has some dental molding detail across the front of it.  I was trying to use my angled brush to get paint in there, but it was just too big.  So I had the brilliant idea to use a craft brush!  I rushed inside to grab one from the office, and skipped back out, feeling triumphant.  I sat down in front of the nightstand, picked up the paint pot to get started, and DUMPED PAINT ALL OVER MYSELF!  Way to go self!  I frantically tried to scoop paint off my shorts, and then hobbled into the house while trying not to drip everywhere, so that I wouldn't have to remove my pants on my front lawn!!  Did I mention that I was wearing one of my favorite pairs of shorts when this happened?  Yea, that should be DIY 101, don't wear anything you are fond of when painting!  Lesson learned.  And up until this point it had all been going so well!

Oh, and while I was failing big time, my wonderful hubby was busy spray painting the hardware.  So I never managed to get a shot of that action.  Fired, I know.

Here's a quick shot I grabbed later of the hardware. It's a nice glossy black, with a bit of texture due to the hammered finish.

So after an outfit change, a second coat of paint, and several hours outside drying, here he is!

Hello Handsome!  I'm really pleased with the way it turned out.  And the longer he sits by our bedside, the more I love him!  The traditional lines with the updated paint and hardware make me happy :)  And this whole makeover happened for one dollar, since we were given the nightstand, already had the spray paint, and found that little test pot on clearance!  

So what have you made over recently?  Anyone else like to spill paint all over their nice clothes?  Only me?